The Koonzy Paddle Premiers Tonight @ SJSU

06/01 Friday - 06/10 Sunday

Thurs, Fri: 8pm
Sat: 7pm
Sun: 3pm

The Koonzy Paddle

The Koonzy Paddle is a bare-knuckled story about two salty, conflicted brothers, Lyle and Darryl Driggers. Darryl -- long after his divorce and in the grip of resurgent alcoholism -- marries a young woman he has met through an internet mail order bride service. When his new wife betrays him, trouble ensues, and Darryl escapes to the home of his brother and sister-in-law. With the arrival of his vindictive daughter, their lives become a turmoil of comic conflict that awakens memories of sibling grudges and a poignant past, causing the brothers to engage in their ludicrous childhood ritual of "gettin' even."

This humorous play is being co-produced by Spotlite Stage Company and Chamber Productions in association with the SJSU Alumni Association's Alumni Outreach Campaign.

The entire cast and crew are comprised of current students and alumni from SJSU's Theatre Department and is a "Tribute" to the late Theatre Department Chairman, Dr. Hal J Todd.

It was co-directed by Erica Schwehr and it features Steve Trinwith, Wendy Howard-Benham, Stephanie Marsh Ballard and Wes Finlay.

Organization: Chamber Productions & Spotlite Stage Company

Location:

Hal Todd Theatre - San Jose State University

5th Street & San Fernando Street

San Jose 95192

See map: Google Maps

408-400-3818

koonzy.tix@comcast.net

Website:

Event Website

Ticket Information: Opening Night $25 Friday and Saturday evenings $25 (Student/Senior $15) Thursday Evening $20 (Student/Senior $15) Sunday Matinees $15 (Student/Senior $10)

Free Pass to the San Jose Greek Festival!

The Greek Festival is taking place this weekend near St. Nicholas Greek Orthodox Church. There will be tons of food, music, and entertainment. Just print out the flyer below and you'll get in for free!

For a full list of events, click here.

From Blight to Bright - A Cycle Centered Community Cleanup morning in Willow Glen

by Carlos from One Square Mile

Willow Glen Neighborhood Association to launch “from Blight to Bright”; a series of community led beautification projects

Community Cleanup to encourage local residents to walk to “The Avenue”

Photo:BikePortland.org

The Willow Glen Neighborhood Association is hosting the first in a series of community cleanup days this summer on June 9, at 9:30 am until 12:30 pm. This event seeks to highlight the importance of the growing residential communities to the north, along with the increased need for safe and clean areas to walk and bike. From Blight to Bright will include residents from the Elements Apartment Community along with participants in San Jose’s monthly Bike Party rides; helping to move tools and debris by bike.

“With budget cuts severely limiting city services, we felt the Willow Glen community should help out” said Richard Zappelli, Vice President of the Willow Glen Neighborhood Association and tireless community advocate. “We have received tremendous support from our members, the Elements Apartment Community, and our District 6 City Councilmember Pierluigi Oliverio.

The bicycling community has also responded by offering some of their ‘work” bikes to help move food, tools, and debris. As many residents and visitors of Willow Glen are aware, “The Avenue” is clean and well landscaped due to the efforts of the Willow Glen Business Association and financial support from the Willow Glen Community Benefit Improvement District.

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When: Saturday, June 9th, 9:30 am to 12:30 pm
Where: A 1,900 foot section of Lincoln Ave. from Coe Ave. north to Parkmoor Ave. (see map)
Meet at: The Elements, 1201 Parkmoor Avenue, San Jose, CA, for breakfast, tools and assignments. (see map)
Transit available: Light Rail line 902 at Race Street Station, VTA Bus 65 on Parkmoor. With a 12 minute walk from Stevens Creek Blvd. to the north, routes 81 and 23, and with a 24 minute
walk from Coe Ave. to the south via VTA route 64 (see map)
Tools: We will have some tools but feel free to bring your own brooms, hoes, and gloves. See registration via link below. Also if you have a bike trailer that would be great.
To register (to get a count for food and tools): Click here

For the full press release, click here.

Wednesday Wishlist: Bike Sharing Program

Oh wait a minute... this one is actually coming true. Check out this post from our friends at One Square Mile:

San Jose Bikeshare announces 20 proposed stations
by noreply@blogger.com (Carlos)

Last Tuesday, May 22, San Jose Bikeshare announced 20 proposed locations to place Bikeshare pods within the downtown and Japantown areas (see Google Map below). Obvious key locations such as City Hall, SJSU, Diridon Station, and the HP Pavillion were included but other lower key areas of downtown were included as well.

The stations extend from Japantown in the north, Gore Park in the south, Diridon Station in the west, and 9th and San Salvador on the eastern edge of downtown. For those of you who missed the news this summer the city is planning to begin work to close the eastern streetside of Gore Park, South 1st St. to through traffic creating (after Paseo de San Antonio) one of San Jose's few permanent street closures or Paseos.

What do you think of the locations? Could you do any better? Let us know what you think.

For the latest in San Jose Bikeshare news follow them on Twitter.

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View San Jose Bike Share - Proposed Locations in a larger map

5th Annual SubZERO Festival This Friday @ SoFA!!!

The ultimate South First Friday is happening this week on June 1st from 6pm to midnight... SubZERO! In addition to all of the art venues in SoFA being open late, there is live music on 3 different stages, an epic number of street artists and vendors, 10 food trucks, a craft beer tasting garden, and tons of surprises at every corner. If you only come out to a single South First Friday a year, this is the one.

ANNO DOMINI's STAGE with Emcee "Mighty" Mike McGee
(South First St. btwn San Carlos & San Salvador Streets)

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• 6:30-7:10pm FIERCE CREATURES
• 7:30-8:15pm SAN FRANCESCA
• 8:45-9:30pm MONSTERS CALLING HOME
• 10:00-10:45pm FORREST DAY
• 11:15-11:45 STREET DRUM CORPS

WILLIAM STREET STAGE hosted by Grand Fanali
(South First St. btwn Williams & Reed Streets)

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Justin Morales (aka Seabright) is a deejay from KSCU. He will be filling in the gaps with good sounds all night.

• 6:00-6:45pm COMFORT SLACKS
• 7:10-8:10pm MINIBOSSES
• 8:30-9:15pm CURIOUS QUAIL
• 9:45-10:20 FLESH WEAPON
• 10:50-11:30 DRU

SECRET GARDEN STAGE 
(San Salvador St. btwn South First & Market Streets)

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• 7:00-7:45pm TBA
• 8:00-8:45pm DREAM HOUSE
• 9:00-9:45pm VIDA KILLZ
• 10:00-10:45pm DIRTY PILLOWS

FOOD TRUCKS + MORE

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• Barefoot Coffee
• Bill's Hot Dogs
• Mini Yums
• MoBowl
• MoGo BBQ
• Soulnese
• Treatbot
• O Mi Ninja
• Quick Dog
• The WOW Truck

Better Brew Tasting Garden

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Lagunitas presents Better Brew Tasting hosted by BetterBeerBlog

Participating Breweries:

• Bay Brewers Guild
• Lagunitas Brewing Company
• Rock Bottom Brewing
• Strike Brewing Co.
• Tied House Brewery & Café / Hermitage Brewing
• Uncommon Brewers
• Peter B's Brewpub
• Seabright Brewery*
• Stone Brewing Company
• Campbell Brewing Company*
• Santa Cruz Ale Works*
• Rabbit's Foot Meadery*
• Gordon Biersch Brewing Company*
• Cedar Street Brewing*
• Bay Brewers Guild
• more to be announced ...

Improvements to The Alameda Kicking off Soon

The Alameda near Downtown San Jose is about to get $3.9M worth of renovations. There will be new median strips, LED lighting, and safer crosswalks. Most of this will be paid for by the Metropolitan Transportation Commission with about 20% coming from the city of San Jose. The renovations kick off in September and will be capped off with a repaving of the entire street from the HP Pavilion to 880.

If the business owners along the strip are willing to pay for maintenance in the future, they may at some point also add flowing plants, new benches, and extensive landscaping across the sidewalks. After all this is completed, the Alameda could become a very nice walkable district. It's already home to many great retails spots, including The Usuals, Crema, La Dolce Velo, Wine Affairs, and The Arsenal.

Source: The Merc

"A Day in the Park" Event Today @ St. James Park

There is a new grassroots organizations in town called IAMSANJOSE whose mission is to bring people together and revitalize San Jose. Their first focus area is St. James park, which has been a homeless refuge for years. They are planning on several events that will not only improve perception of the area, but raise money to clean up the park. All the proceeds from today's event are going to the Salvation Army in order to get the homeless around St. James park the help they need.

Today's event entitled "A Day in the Park" will feature 8 food trucks, live music, and raffles. For all the info keep on reading or have a peek at the IAMSANJOSE website over here.

DATE: May 27th, 2012
TIME: 12pm-5pm PT – 5 hours
LOCATION: St James Park, San Jose (2nd St and St James St, San Jose, CA 95113)

SAN JOSE, CA – New charitable organization, IAMSANJOSE, will launch
on Sunday, May 27th with a benefit event “A Day in the Park” at St. James Park.
IAMSANJOSE’s goal is to revitalize the City of San Jose, focusing first on the
city’s oldest park, St. James Park.

Sunday’s event will bring eight gourmet food trucks and live music to the park
and proceeds will benefit Salvation Army’s homeless services.

Our intent is to revitalize and reactivate the downtown area with initial
emphasis on St James Park. We plan to coordinate a series of events year round
that will bring not only an economic boost but a social rejuvenation to an area of
the city that has long needed it, said IAMSANJOSE co-founder Tin Le.

The estimated 2,000 attendees can expect a variety of food trucks to choose
from, live entertainment, vendors and raffles.

In recent months, we’ve worked with the community to see how we can revive
the park by suppressing criminality, addressing homelessness, and injecting
more family-friendly activity into the park. I’m thrilled that IAMSANJOSE co-
founders Tin Le, Sam Pak and Cary Inayoshi have brought their enthusiasm and
creativity to St. James Park, said Councilmember Sam Liccardo.

About IAMSANJOSE
IAMSANJOSE Mission Statement. IAMSANJOSE’s mission is a
community development movement that focuses in bringing people together
to benefit the city. Working together with various local business owners and
entrepreneurs, our goal is to revitalize the city of San Jose through large, fun,
social and creative fundraising events for local entities and charities.

About St. James Park
The City of San Jose’s St. James Park has a unique place in history as the city’s
oldest park. The park is surrounded by unique structures the Scottish Rite
Temple, the post office, state courthouse, and the St. Claire Club, all adjacent
to the oldest urban park in California’s oldest civil settlement. The park was
designed by America’s foremost landscape architect, Frederick Law Olmstead.
St. James Park is also home to many extraordinary events including marches and
rallies, Bobby Kennedy’s 1968 speech, the grisly lynchings, and performances
by presidents, poets and musicians.

Saturday Stats: Start-up Funding

Start-ups are the lifeblood of Silicon Valley, but historically start-up companies have not really flocked to San Jose. Usually they "graduate" to San Jose when they start needing substantial amounts of office space and resources. However, it looks like that is starting to change based on where the VC money is going.

In terms of Venture Capital invested in start-up companies regionally, San Jose did miserably in 2009. In the bay area they ranked 11th, behind Palo Alto and even San Carlos (!).

In 2011, San Jose clawed its way to 4th place with three quarters of a billion dollars invested between 43 companies:

1.) San Francisco - $2.87 billion
2.) Palo Alto - $1.3 billion
3.) Mountain View - $1.03 billion
4.) San Jose - $784.2 million

This is a trend that I think will continue for multiple reasons, but I think the top one is start-ups looking more for urbanized locations. That's why they are flocking to downtown Palo Alto, Mountain View, Campbell, SF, etc. Start-ups require a high-energy environment and employees working 80+ hour weeks expect instant access to the conveniences urban areas offer.

The good news is San Jose is urbanizing faster than any other city in Silicon Valley right now, and has ambitions plans to build future urban villages pretty much everywhere. Downtown is becoming a legitimate destination for incubators and startups, North First is going to explode over the next 2 decades, midtown is being built up, the area around the HP Pavilion is slated to become an "innovation district," and Santana Row is building mass amounts of office space. All of these areas have the potential to attract hot start-ups, especially as the perception of San Jose only being suburban dies off. To boot, we have the lowest housing costs (besides Gilroy) and best transportation infrastructure in the South Bay. I think we have a winning recipe and I'm really looking forward to seeing how the 2012 funding number stack up.

Source: SiliconBeat