Breathe Deep Bay Area 5k Walk/Fun Run on June 1st

Breathe Deep Bay Area is a grassroots event planned and managed by a small group of volunteers from the Bay Area whose lives have been impacted by lung cancer. This 5K walk and run is an opportunity for our community to rally together against lung cancer. They started in 2011 and their next run is one week from today--Sunday, June 1st--at the Discovery Meadow Park behind the Children's Discovery Museum. It's a great cause and they have already raised over half of their $30k goal!

Who: Anyone in the Bay Area!
What: Breathe Deep Bay Area, 5K walk and fun run
Where: Discovery Meadow Park in Guadalupe River Park & Gardens, San Jose (180 Woz Way)
When: Sunday, June 1st, 9:00am for the run, 10:00am for the walk
Why: To raise money for lung cancer research and to raise awareness for this disease!

For more information: www.lungevity.org/bayarea

Camera 12 is Dramatically REDUCING Prices for the Summer!

This is a big announcement for Downtown San Jose residents and visitors. While most theaters are continuing to increase prices at an alarming rate, Camera Cinemas is slashing them at my favorite movie theater, Camera 12. The price for all movies including brand new blockbusters will be $5.50 during the day and $8.50 at night, all summer long.

To top it off, they will also introduce D-BOX premium seats that can sway and jolt along with the movie. The motion seats will debut in the largest auditorium on May 29th with Disney's Maleficent. These seats are already available at Camera 7 in the Pruneyard and you will be able to preview them in the Camera 12 lobby with trailers of new movies.

I think this will have a big impact in bringing even more people to Downtown San Jose. Camera 12 is the only theater that is steps away from a Light Rail Station, it's the only 3-story theater in Silicon Valley, and it's the only theater playing mainstream movies Downtown. The price cut makes it a no-brainer to patronize and support! Press release below.


CAMERA CINEMAS INTRODUCES BUCKBUSTER SAVINGS IN DOWNTOWN SAN JOSE SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA – May 18th, 2014

If you don’t go to the movies very often due to the expense, then you have an unlikely ally in Camera 12 Cinemas. The Silicon Valley theater chain’s co-founder and president Jack Nyblom is willing to stare down the elephant in the room: ever-increasing admission prices. Looking at the blockbuster summer ahead, Nyblom had thoughts about making it affordable to patrons who like to go to the movies once a week or more.

"At Camera 12, we looked at how it can be a challenge for a lot of folks to see all of the exciting first-run films coming up.” Nyblom says. “Why should a family or a struggling student or a couple on date have to pay a small fortune to go to the movies? In thanks for all of the support we’ve received from our loyal patrons, we thought this summer we wanted to give them something back.”

It’s called the Summer Buckbuster and it starts on May 23rd with the superhero epic X-MEN: DAYS OF FUTURE PAST and the Adam Sandler comedy BLENDED. While other theater chains are charging as much as $13 per ticket, movies at Camera 12 will cost $5.50 during the day and $8.50 in the evening.

Another upgrade at Camera 12 this summer is D-BOX, premium-priced seats that move with the action on screen—the audience sways with a dangerous helicopter maneuver or feels a jolt when a character on screen takes a punch. The D-BOX kiosk is already in the Camera 12 lobby so patrons can try out the motion seats with trailers for GODZILLA and TRANSFORMERS: AGE OF EXTINCTION. The motion seats will debut in the largest auditorium at Camera 12 on May 29th with the release of Disney’s MALEFICENT.

Best known for bringing sophisticated international films to the South Bay since 1975, Camera Cinemas now operates three locations in San Jose and Campbell, providing a hub for the most prominent film festivals in the Silicon Valley area as well as the latest major studio releases, all exhibited on state-of-the-art Sony 4K digital projectors.

Camera 12 Cinemas, located at 201 S. 2nd Street in downtown San Jose, provides parking validation for three hours.

Saturday Stats: San Jose Metro Unemployment Rate Drops

Silicon Valley's unemployment rate dropped again last month to a stellar 5.4% (5.3% if you eliminate San Benito County, not sure why it is included in these figures). This is down from 6.3% in March. This confirms what many of us already know, the local job market is on fire--in a good way.

How does that 5.4% compare? California's average unemployment rate is 7.3% and the nation's unemployment rate is 5.9%. This means we are outperforming both the state and country in terms of the jobs market.

Source: SVBJ

San Jose Greek Festival 2014 Next Week (FREE ADMISSION)

The annual Greek Festival is taking place next week from Friday, May 30th to Sunday, June 1st at Saint Nicholas Church in San Jose's Rose Garden neighborhood. This is one of if not the largest ethnic festival in San Jose, and is definitely worth checking out. Just about all of the food is completely home made, and they have the best lokoumades anywhere in the Bay Area (fried doughnut holes drenched in honey and covered in walnuts and cinnamon). They will also be serving lamb chops from Evvia/Kokkari restaurants--the best Greek places I know of around here. Of course, in addition to awesome food you will also have music, dancing, a kids area, and contests.

You can print out the last image below for free admission and there should be plenty of free parking in the general area with shuttles to take you to the festival. For more information, please visit the San Jose Greek Festival Facebook page.

Paper Plane Review on the San Jose Food Blog

I'm embarrassed to say that I have yet to check out Paper Plane. My day job has made it next to impossible to catch up on all of the great restaurants that have opened over the last few months.

Paper Plane is brought to you by the proprietors behind Original Gravity, the first craft-beer oriented pub in Downtown San Jose. Check out the great review for this establishment over at the San Jose Food Blog!

Wednesday Wishlist: Cool Steps

The San Jose art scene is really moving in the right direction, especially Downtown with various projects to turn boring objects into works of art. Examples include Downtown Doors, the wrapped utility boxes, yarn bombing, painted benches, and several that are in the works such as the "art crosswalks" and LED lit underpasses. Japantown is also doing a great job with their murals. However, there is always more that we can do.

I ran across a site with amazing painted staircases from all over the world. There are quite a few areas where we could do something like this. Immediately the steps leading up to the San Jose Museum of Art and "The Stairs" at Communication Hill come to mind. Where else could we add art to stairs in San Jose like the photos below?

While we are on the topic of new canvases for art, I would like to bring up an old post about simple, "interactive" art that I ran across in Israel. Here is the link.

Source: Bored Panda

Sake San Jose - This Thursday @ Japantown

The 9th Annual Sake San Jose will take place from 5:30pm to 8:30pm this Thursday in San Jose's Japantown (Jackson between 3rd and 7th). Not only will you get a chance to sample many different Sake's across Japantown, but this entire event is a fundraiser for the Yu-ai Kai Senior Service organization, so you will be drinking for a good cause! All of the details are below:

Yu-Ai Kai’s 9th Annual Sake San Jose event will be held on Thursday, May 22, 2014 from 5:30 PM to 8:30 PM. Join the hundreds of sake tasters as they embark upon the streets of historic Japantown San Jose (on Jackson Street, between 3rd and 7th Streets) for one of the most anticipated fundraisers of the year.

This year’s opening ceremony will again feature our guests of honor in a ceremonial sake cask breaking (Kagami-wari) and a toast of Kanpai! Approximately 25 Japantown businesses will host a pouring station, where Yu-Ai Kai volunteers will offer samples of sake made both in Japan and the U.S.

Early Bird tickets are $40 when purchased by May 18th; $50 after May 18. There is also a VIP ticket for $60 which includes admission, a Horitaka design Year of the Horse T-shirt, and express check-in line at Registration.

Returning again this year will be celebrities participating at various pouring stations. So don’t be surprised if you see a familiar face. Check the News and Update Section as they are confirmed.

WHEN:	May 22, 2014 5:30pm-8:30pm
WHERE:	Japantown San Jose On Jackson Street Between 3rd and 7th Streets
TICKETS:	BUY NOW!

St. James Park Food Trucks!

I think we can all agree that there is a lot of work to be done to restore St. James Park, perhaps the park with the most history in all of San Jose. With several new development projects happening on the periphery of the park, we need to do everything we can to change this from an encampment for the homeless to one of Downtown's key attractions.

Ryan Sebastian, the proprietor behind Treatbot, Moveable Feast, and the San Jose Taco Festival of Innovation, is planning to bring lunch-time food trucks to St. James Park as soon as June. Instead of a regular weekly food truck event, he is envisioning something a bit different. He is trying to get a Food Truck "pod" in the park that would feature lunch trucks daily. I think this would go a long way to reducing the non-homeless to homeless ration in the park and improving the quality of the community there, especially in combination with other improvements being discussed like a music pavilion. I wish him the best of luck!

Oh and while we are on the topic of parks, check out this great article in Think Bigger San Jose about improving Plaza de Cesar Chavez.

Source: SVBJ