Phone connection - nearly

Today was the day when the engineer would turn up and connect us to the great BT/Openreach network, so by providing us with a working phone line and basic broadband.  The engineer turned up at the allotted time and set about connecting us to the 21st century.  He spent nearly 3 hours with us and as a result the house is now connected to the phone lines outside.  There is however a problem!  Apparently the line from the nearby pole heads off towards the cabinet, but according to his equipment, it is disconnected at a point 87 metres further on.  Unfortunately, the cabinet is located at a point beyond 87 metres meaning that we still have no connection to the outside world!
The engineers estimate is that this 'should' be investigated and sorted 'some time next week'!  There is obviously another definition of the phrase "100% guaranteed" that I was previously unaware of.

The line leaving the study

..and up the side of the house towards the pole

..to reach the pole but little further!

I left it 3 hours and contacted the help desk and endured the long wait (albeit not quite as long as some of the previous calls) to actually speak to someone.  The engineer had indeed submitted his report and BT are no longer just 'sorry', they are now 'extremely sorry'.  It turns out that my 'Complaint Manager' should have contacted me about this, but had not and they were very sorry about that too!   Apparently a 'multi-skilled' engineer has been called and according to the BT/Openreach 'arrangement' Openreach have to provide one within 2 working days.
So it now looks like we may get a connection some time next week, but in the meantime I have had to postpone the visit from the 'renewables' people who were coming tomorrow to put our heating, ventilation and solar panel system on line and allow control from a single point rather than the many thermostats, boost controls and other sensors liberally distributed throughout the house.

Despite all this frustration, we have moved in and we have had two sets of visitors so we are able to entertain at least a little.  Most of the other work is focused on the garage and the landscaping of the garden.  This week, the foundations for the sleeper support walls have been finished and the sleepers have been laid.  The next job is back-filling, levelling out the 'lawn' area in front of the sleepers and replacing all the top-soil.  Then there is all the paving to lay.

Bed to the left, 'lawn' to the right

Stepped to match the  slope down to the canal