Quest for a dry basement: post the fourth

So the concrete man came yesterday and already he's half done. The patio concrete is all gone. They even took out all the steps except the bit we need to hold up the house. It's hard to tell, I didn't get a good before picture right under the sliding glass door, but there used to be a pronounced slope towards the house (it was particularly bad under the deck where the basement window is). He's already leveled out the ground, and he'll be packing it down (not sure what that means, but I think it involves machines) before he pours the concrete. The board marks the border for the new patio:

And here you can see the other board, marking where the new patio will end. We still haven't figured out what we're going to do with the rest of the former-patio space, but there's been talk of paving stones or maybe a rock garden:

And one last pic. When the concrete man gave us the estimate, it was cheaper if we let them use a Bobcat than if we made them take it all out by hand. I was wondering at the time why anyone would not go with the Bobcat option. Now I know:

I'm not too worried. We have mutant grass; that will bounce back in a week or two.