‘Superhero’ gets transfusion, dons cape
There’s a strong case to be made that the San Jose Sharks’ play of the week wasn’t on the ice but instead happened Friday on the pediatric floor of Kaiser Permanente Santa Clara. Players Paul Martin, Ben Smith and Joel Ward — along with broadcasters Jamie Baker and Dan Rusanowsky — played hero for the kids on the floor and helped the young patients find their inner superhero, complete with personalized cape, during the visit.
It’s the kind of thing that Capes4Heroes has been doing for the past eight years, distributing superhero capes to thousands of kids facing medical and other challenges in the Bay Area and throughout the country. “It gives them a little gust of joy and happiness,” said Capes4Heroes founder Barbara Casados, of Danville. “It empowers them to have these amazing heroes of theirs here and then to acknowledge them as superheroes, too.”
The Sharks team members — all wearing capes themselves — helped the kids pick out their capes, which were then personalized for them by volunteers on sewing machines. Kids who couldn’t come out to the floor’s waiting area had theirs delivered to their room by the Sharks.
The event sure brightened the day for Tyler DeCourcey, a 5 ½-year-old boy who was decked out in Sharks gear, ready for Ward to help him find the perfect cape — red on the outside, with Marvel Comics characters inside. “He just had a blood transfusion today, so this is a really nice outing for him,” said Tyler’s mom, Sylvia DeCourcey, of Belmont.
All in a day’s work for San Jose’s own Men of Teal.
CINEMATIC SYMPHONY: Symphony Silicon Valley’s “Lord of the Rings” concerts last year were very popular, so this year the San Jose orchestra will be performing live scores for a new trio of movie blockbusters. It all gets started this coming weekend with Steven Spielberg’s 1981 adventure, “Raiders of the Lost Ark,” which will be shown Jan.
15, 16 and 17 at the Center for the Performing Arts.
The movie — accompanied by a live orchestra score — had its world premiere in December in Lucerne, Switzerland, where it played 10 sold-out performances.
From San Jose, the movie heads to the Sydney Opera House in Australia. Tickets range from $70 to $95, which is a lot for a movie but not bad for a two-hour symphony performance of a classic, though not classical, movie score by John Williams.
The series continues with “The Godfather Live in Concert” on April 8-10 and “Titanic Live in Concert” on May 20-22. Tickets for all the performances are available at www.symphonysiliconvalley. org.
SMART SELECTION: Code for America founder and Executive Director Jennifer Pahlka will receive
the David Packard Award for civic entrepreneurship from Joint Venture at next month’s State of the Valley conference.
Pahlka, a former U.S. deputy chief of technology officer in the White House Office of Science and Technology who is known for her TED talk, “Coding a Better Government,” has lived up to the spirit of the award, which is presented to people who bring an entrepreneurial approach to the challenges in our region, following in the example of the late Hewlett-Packard founder.
“Jennifer Pahlka is the very definition of a civic entrepreneur who works across boundaries to benefit our community,” said Joint Venture CEO Russell Hancock . “She has played an important role in both the public and private sectors with Code for America, a nonprofit organization the Washington Post calls the technology world’s equivalent of the Peace Corps or Teach for America.”
Pahlka will receive the award Feb. 12 at the San Jose McEnery Convention Center, the site of the daylong “town hall” meeting for Silicon Valley. Get more information and register at www.
jointventure.org.
CRUISING THE AUTO SHOW: The biggest jaw-dropper at this weekend’s Silicon Valley Auto Show may be the Trion Nemesis “supercar,” the 2,000-horsepower turbo luxury car that is said to retail for $1.2 million. I mean, you could almost buy a house around here for that kind of money.
This is the first time that the car has been on public display, so it’s been getting a lot of attention at the San Jose McEnery Convention Center. It’s surrounded by barriers, though, so don’t even think about trying to find out how the front seat feels.
And for those who keep track of such things, this is the first time in nearly a decade that the show isn’t being presented by Motor Trend. The Silicon Valley Auto Dealers Association decided the time had come to produce the show itself, and this year’s edition — themed “The Future of Drive” — seems to be doing just fine.
One good change, in my opinion: All the vendors selling model cars, leather goods and the like are gone. Something that didn’t change, thankfully: The show gave some thought to moving to the Santa Clara Convention Center this year, but the NFL has that all locked up for weeks because of the Super Bowl. Something to look for next year: The dealers are hoping to attract more valley tech companies to display their car-related gadgets.
Maybe an Oculus Rift VR driving experience?
Finally, another nice thing about a local show: Steve Smith, president of the Auto Dealers Association, told me the group gave away about $3,500 worth of tickets to valley schools so the students could visit the show.
And I’m betting most of them don’t even drive yet.
The show continues through Sunday. Get tickets there or at www.svautoshow.com.
UNCOMMON HONOREES: James Hormel , the San Francisco philanthropist and former U.S.
ambassador to Luxembourg, leads a distinguished and diverse group being honored in March by the Commonwealth Club. Silicon Valley is well represented in this list of honorees, with Robyn Denholm, the CFO and COO of Juniper Networks; Theranos founder Elizabeth Holmes; Stanford physicist Charles Munger Jr.; and Adobe Systems co-founder Chuck Geschke, who will receive the William K. Bowes Jr. Lifetime Achievement Award.
They all will be feted at the Commonwealth Club’s 28th annual Distinguished Citizen gala, “Beyond Boundaries,” on March 16 at the San Francisco Fairmont Hotel. Get more information at www.commonwealthclub.org.
Contact Sal Pizarro at spizarro@mercurynews.com. Follow him at Facebook.com/mercurynews.
aroundtown and Twitter.com/ spizarro.
Tyler DeCourcey, 5, strikes a heroic pose with San Jose Sharks broadcaster Jamie Baker after getting his personalized cape at the Capes4Heroes event Friday at Kaiser Permanente Santa Clara.
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