More digging!

So the CenturyLink tech arrived.  Bottom line:  we need to sit tight for probably another week.

Evidently, pair-bonded service, what one needs to get speeds like 12M, needs two cable pairs. And we currently only have one available.  Yes, there are two from the curb to the house, but

1. one is currently in use by the landline+Megapath, and I'm thinking it would be a Rather Bad Idea to chop that up before we have the new stuff actually working (can't even get the new IP numbers until the new service is established, hence can't program the new firewall yet, etc),
2. being 1971-vintage wire, the twisted pairs are really not all that twisty, and for the higher speeds this starts to matter, never mind that it's already been spliced once (thank you gas company) and the junction once it gets to the house has certain spaghetti aspects to it (some of this being left-over bullshit from 10 years ago when they were first setting up the line for Speakeasy, so it's probably never going to perform to full capacity anyway

and, it seems, CenturyLink is quite happy to install a new, modern cable with 6+ pairs, free of charge.

Me: "So, this is an intelligence test?"

Except they can't do that today. He has to place a dig order for this. Which means some time in the next week a digging company is going to show up with the mole thingie to run yet another tunnel under my lawn (after they have first carefully mapped out where all of the Other Stuff is).

I think it will be absolutely hilarious if they manage to slice our new gas line.