Unfortunately, my long house construction project is conflicting with the date with for the Google Zurich Energy Efficiency summit, and we are in the midst of moving in. I just couldn't spare the time as my family needs me to do things around the house. I'll try to blog about the Google event remotely as the Google team shares information from their event.

Many of my data center friends ask about how my house project is going, I'll share an update. The move was not far as we move from our Beach House which is 200 steps below our house where we have lived for the past 20 months.

10 years ago, I wanted to build my staycation space, and this month in Aug '08 Sunset Print Magazine our "Backyard Beach House" is featured. The article is not online yet, but here are some images from the article.

Here are some pictures of the house rebuild we did. Local friends from APC, Microsoft, and Lee Tech have able to drop by, but we have made a lot of progress in the last 2 months.

Here is the front of the house.

A garage bay long enough for a boat trailer with tankless water heaters to the left.

The front door entry.

With a kids organizing area. Above right you can see the Mitsubishi heat pumps that are scattered around the house for heating. There are 14 separate units the house to heat/cool specific rooms.

From the open attic you overlook the entry.

When you come down the stairs to the main living area you pass the study and enter the kitchen. Note the ladder in the picture below is a 10 foot ladder. The ceilings are 12 1/2 feet tall.

Here is a current picture of the 4 french doors to the deck.

And the before picture we used for our Xmas Card.

Looking from the French doors is the entertainment area.

And my Woodstone Pizza oven with handy pizza tools.

From the pizza oven, there is great view of the Lake Sammamish.

Next to the pizza oven is the pantry which we call the "bunker."

Why the bunker? The room is 12 x 12 x 12 surrounded by concrete and sheer walls.

I have lots of work to do in the wiring closet. POE intercom, Security Camera PVR, Slingbox configuration, Cable TV, Wireless, VOIP. I am so glad I have an APC J35 backup solution.

My kid's rooms are in the best shape as they were done a month ago.

Give us another couple of weeks and the master bedroom will get there too.

Which brings me to ultimately one of the reasons why I decided not to go to Zurich. When I told my kids I might not go to Europe, they both cheered that I wouldn't be gone for another week. If I am lucky, I'll not get on a plane for a month.

But starting June 12, I'll be at 7x24Exchange in Orlando, then GigaOm Structure, and Data Center Dynamics in less than 2 weeks of travel.