Okay. Maybe that headline is a bit misleading. This is not actually a post about spending time with Natalie Portman, the actress. It is actually about the local band Natalie Portman's Shaved Head. Maybe we just got stuck in that fantasy world of ours in which we happen across a fellow bike rider with a broken chain and, when we stop to help, it turns out to be Natalie Portman who is so thankful that......

HUGE AMOUNTS OF CHEESE: The Cheese Festival is upon us! This is one of our top three favorite events of the year (#2: our birthday, #3: Christmas). Several reasons: a city block full of cheese, friendly vendors, wholesale prices on bottles in the wine garden (don't buy the red wine that says "bacon" three times in its description, we made that mistake last year), and (it bears repeating) a city block full of cheese. 10......

"yellow dragon on pole" by Seattlest Flickr Pool Contributor Seattle rainscreen. Thanks! It's not every day that the local news headlines look so....well....international. This morning, we've got Seattle money going to China to help out after the horrific earthquake; more information about the death of a museum director in town from Thailand who was in federal custody; Seattle-based federal prosecutors in Baghdad conducting a criminal investigation on a Seattlite paratrooper; and an incinerated tavern......

On Friday evening, Seattlest made our way down to the fashion event of the season: Product Runway at the South Lake Union Naval Reserve. Nineteen teams competed to show the best couture creation made of interior design elements. Glamorous celebrity judges (including Seattle's own Jack Mackenroth), fantastical, high-concept dresses, and an excitingly diverse crowd ranging from young Seattle fashionistas to art students, to representatives from the city's wealthiest families, turned this night into nothing......

CHARITABLE INDULGENCES: If you're not too hungover from tonight's couture cocktails with Jack Mackenroth at Product Runway, something beautiful involving imported beer and fine Scotch is happening in Fremont both tonight and tomorrow: the HopScotch Spring Beer and Scotch Festival. The festival's a benefit for NW Folklife, so think of your purchase of extra tequila tastings as an act of springtime charity. 5 p.m.-12 a.m. Friday, 1 p.m.-12 a.m. Saturday // Fremont Studios, 155 N.......