Courtyard House: The Road to an Industrial Power

She stepped forward, leaning on her cane, coughed twice, and said slowly:

"Director Zhao, let it go. She's a pitiful person too; she lost her son and life is hard for her."

"I still have some savings I had when I was young, fifty yuan. I'll donate it to the neighborhood committee as an apology."

Zhao Xiulan glanced at her, understanding the deaf old woman's thoughts, but she didn't want to make things too awkward.

She hesitated for a moment and said, "Since the deaf old lady has pleaded for you, let's put aside the matter of sending you back to the countryside for now."

"But you can't escape punishment. Your deadline for cleaning the courtyard just expired, and now we're adding two more weeks! If you dare cause trouble again, you'll be sent straight to the countryside!"

Madam Jia nodded vigorously, not daring to utter a single complaint.

After the meeting, an older woman helped the deaf old woman back into her house.

As soon as she entered, an older woman couldn't help but ask, "Grandma, why are you taking out your own money to help her?"

The deaf old woman sat in her chair, her face grim, and said, "What do you know? In this courtyard, only that fool Jia Zhangshi dares to go against the Lin family."

"Keeping her around means she can cause Lin Weidong trouble every now and then, and disgust their family. If we send her away, who else in this compound can cause trouble for the Lin family?"

For half a month, the lights in the military workshop of the steel rolling mill stayed on until the early hours of the morning.

The manufacturing of four-axis CNC machine tools has entered a critical stage, but the machining accuracy of the guide rails still cannot meet the requirements of the drawings.

In the workshop, the veteran engineers frowned as they looked around the semi-finished guide rails, repeatedly picking up and putting down calipers and micrometers.

"This is the limit of what we can do," Master Wang said, looking at the machine in front of him.

Lin Weidong and Su Wanqing squatted next to the machine tool, holding design drawings in their hands.

During this period, the two practically lived and worked in the workshop, studying the blueprints countless times and trying various methods such as adjusting cutting parameters and changing tool materials. However, the accuracy issue remained a hurdle in their path.

"Chief Engineer Lin, could it be a problem with the grinding process?" Su Wanqing suddenly asked.

"When I was doing experiments at Harbin Institute of Technology, I saw a method of manual fine grinding that used polishing paste with a special polishing rod to control the error within one micrometer."

Lin Weidong's eyes suddenly lit up. He had only thought about using machine tools for precision machining, but he had overlooked the tedious method of manual finishing.

He slapped his thigh: "That's it! We can use machine tools for rough processing first, and then use hand tools for the final finishing step!"

The two got right to work. Su Wanqing found polishing paste and a high-hardness alloy polishing rod, while Lin Weidong personally polished the contact surface of the polishing rod according to the curvature of the guide rail.

After an unknown amount of time, Su Wanqing stopped what she was doing and picked up a micrometer to take measurements.

Upon seeing the reading, she excitedly exclaimed, "It's done! The error is only 0.8 micrometers! It perfectly meets the standard!"

With the bottleneck in machine tool manufacturing broken, subsequent assembly work progressed rapidly.

Meanwhile, the renovation of the west courtyard of Lin Weidong's house was also completed.

The newly built courtyard wall is neat and sturdy, the originally dilapidated house has been repainted, and the ground has been paved with smooth blue bricks.

They also opened a separate gate that leads directly to the alley, so you no longer have to go through the main gate of the courtyard house.

On the day of the move, Zhao Xiulan couldn't stop smiling, and Lin Jianjun and her colleagues from the workshop all came to help.

Su Wanqing also busied herself, moving furniture and tidying up the house, working up a sweat.

Looking at the newly renovated west courtyard, Lin Weidong felt a sense of satisfaction.

The deaf old woman, leaning on her cane, shakily arrived at the entrance of the west courtyard.

She stopped Lin Weidong, who was about to leave, and said with a forced smile:

"Weidong, the new gate to your west courtyard is really convenient."

"Look at this old woman, my legs aren't very strong, and it's too much trouble for me to go to the public toilet every day. Could you please open a small door in your courtyard wall so I can use the toilet here?"

Lin Weidong shook his head and refused without even thinking:

"No, if you think the public restroom is too far, you can report it to the neighborhood office. I can't help you with that."

These words left the deaf old woman speechless. She opened her mouth, but in the end, she could only leave dejectedly.

Back home, the deaf old woman grew angrier and angrier. With nowhere to vent her anger, she started plotting against Jia Zhangshi again.

She found Jia Zhangshi, who was squatting by the door pasting matchboxes, and egged her on, "You good-for-nothing! That brat Lin Weidong has taken over the west wing, and now that he has a new door, he doesn't recognize us anymore!"

"Go ahead and make a scene! Go cry at his door and make him open the side door! If he dares to refuse, just lie on the ground and don't get up!"

But Jia Zhangshi waved her hands repeatedly: "I'm not going! I'm not going! My arm still hurts from Su Wanqing's pinch last time! Director Zhao even said he'd send me back to the countryside, I can't afford to cause any more trouble!"

She was now completely terrified. Lin Weidong and Su Wanqing were not to be trifled with, and Zhao Xiulan was a woman of her word. She didn't want to be sent back to the countryside to eat coarse food.

Seeing Jia Zhangshi's cowardly appearance, the deaf old woman trembled with anger and pointed at her nose, cursing:

"You idiot! You coward! You're utterly useless! Keeping you around is worse than sending you back to the countryside to feed pigs!"

After finishing her tirade, the deaf old woman turned and left, secretly plotting to herself:

Jia Zhangshi is a useless pawn. We'll find an opportunity to file a complaint with the neighborhood committee and get rid of her so she won't be an eyesore in the courtyard.

The series of misfortunes made the deaf old woman's temper increasingly irritable.

When she got home, an older woman was bringing in a bowl of thin porridge. Seeing that she looked unwell, she couldn't help but offer a word of advice:

"Grandma, please don't be angry. It's not worth ruining your health."

The deaf old woman raised her hand and knocked over the bowl of porridge in the middle-aged woman's hand, spilling the thin porridge all over the ground.

"You dare to lecture me? If you weren't so useless and couldn't keep Qin's mother, would I have ended up in this situation?"

"You traitorous wretch! You've served me for so long, and you're utterly useless!"

Looking at the porridge scattered on the ground, the old woman recalled the grievances she had suffered from being bossed around by the deaf old woman these past few days, and her long-suppressed anger finally erupted.

She straightened her back and said coldly, "I've served you for so long, doing my best, but you've never treated me like a human being. From today onwards, I'm quitting! You can live on your own!"

After saying that, the old woman turned around, went back into the house, packed her things, and walked out of the deaf old woman's house without looking back, returning to her own home.

The deaf old woman sat on the cold stool, feeling both angry and panicked.

Without the old lady's care, she couldn't even get a hot meal.

The next day happened to be Sunday, and Lin Weidong and Sha Zhu discussed going to the west courtyard for a meal together.

Upon hearing this, Sha Zhu exclaimed, "Great idea, Dongzi! Leave this to me. I'll go prepare the materials right away, and we'll all have a proper celebration for you tonight!"

"Hey! Brother Zhu, how can I let you provide the ingredients? My parents have already gone to buy them. You can cook tonight."

At this moment, He Daqing, who came in from outside, said, "I'll be in charge of cooking tonight, and Zhuzi will assist me."

"Dad, that's not fair! Dongzi asked me to cook, how can you try to take this opportunity from me?"

He Daqing said disdainfully, "Your cooking skills are still a bit lacking compared to your father's. Tonight, I'll let everyone have a good taste of my cooking."

Seeing this, Lin Weidong said, "Then I'll have to trouble you tonight, Uncle He and Brother Zhu."

He Daqing and his son said, "It's nothing, we're just neighbors."