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Family: Colossal Fossils, starting May 26th, free with attendance. Dinosaurs are cool. This is the next big show at the Pacific Science Center. Those awesome beasts practically come to life when you get an idea of their real size.

Astronomy: Star Party, May 26th, free. Club members set up the telescopes and the public are invited to come by and peer into the night sky. It's not like seeing those picture table books of colorful nebulas, but it is interesting knowing the photon of light took hundreds of millions of years to make the journey to your pupil.

Restaurant: Veil Restaurant, a place the French would call je ne sais quoi. This restaurant is another east-coast dinner-club-themed spot, with the white linen walls and pink neon, transplanting Miami's vibe into Seattle. Veil nicely manages the balance of cutting-edge trendy without becoming garish, although the place becomes too cool for its own good with the unlabeled bathroom doors. Veil becomes noteworthy for an affordable menu, innovative dishes and food of high quality, a large communal dining table that will have you making new friends, and an up-and-coming Seattle cooking talent, Shannon Galusha; he's a switch hitter who's equally impressive with entrée and pastry skills.

Theater: West Side Story, starting March 26th, $22+. This is something everyone should see once as a live performance. It remains timeless because the production really hits everything on 10's - the dancing, the music, and the story line.

Athletic: Wetsuit Demo Day, May 26th, free. If a wetsuit is in your future for either swimming or a triathlon, these folks will answer your questions and get you suited up.

Music: Seattle Choral Company Silver Anniversary Celebration, June 3rd, $15+. In the last issue, we were bragging about O Fortuna; turns out, SCC is doing this next week. SCC celebrates 25 years in Seattle with their biggest hits. This choral organization pumps out the works in top form.

Outdoors: Seven Hills of Kirkland, May 28th, $40, a bike ride with 38-99-mile courses. By the time your legs are through with this, it could feel more like 77 hills. Talk about your buns of steel. That's the thing about living in this area - we have water on one side and mountains on the other, so no matter where you go, it's a lot of up-and-down. Take a cruise on your bike on a sunny day and raise a little money for a good cause in the process.

Writing: Write Habit, May 29th, free. It seems like everybody has at least one good book in them. Here's how to get that one good book out of your noggin and onto paper. This is an especially good workshop if the traditional approaches haven't done it for you, yet.

Business: Why Salespeople Fail, May 23rd, $49. In the end, it's about the money, and if your salespeople are not getting the results you think they could, here's why they're failing and what you can do to fix it. * Also, Marketing Successfully in the Web 2.0 World, May 23rd, $54. There are two new things going on here that companies are wrestling with. First is the pressure of consumer-driven content; second is the flip from push- to pull-oriented messaging. Here's how to start to make sense of this.

Organizations: Seattle Gilbert and Sullivan Society, for your inner Ethel Merman. This society is an amateur group dedicated to musical theater - they're actually one of the oldest performing arts groups here in Seattle. Their big event is an annual three-week stint performing at Seattle Center.

Seattle's Other Power Organizations:
We can all probably cite the obvious powerful organizations in town (Children's Hospital, Gates Foundation, some political groups, or Fred Hutch.) Here are some other groups flying under the radar that are impressive in terms of their membership and impact, but don't receive a lot of notice.

Washington Roundtable: Membership is by invitation, and you need to be the CEO of a substantial company to be invited, although they do allow five regular Joe's to serve. Don't call them - they'll call you.

Initiative for Global Development: Big brains in business, civic life,, and academics take on the heavy issues of global poverty. This is another invitation-only club.

Seattle Foundation: Hand out $50 million to local organizations, and see how popular you'd become. This is for people who want to make a local difference, and want to be smart about their philanthropy.

Social Venture Partners: This is more of a hands-on group, where business and community leaders lend their smarts to help local non-profits.

Institute for Systems Biology, a research institute taking on the new challenge of systems biology. There are a lot of smart brains in this town, but this group still stands out.

PATH is helping to improve health care in impoverished nations through education, better practices, and technology.

Big Fat Hairy Note: There will be no issue next week.

Cool YouTube Video: Here's the blooper reel from KOMO news. Guess they should've passed on that peanut butter sandwich for lunch.

(If you can't see the video, embedding has been disabled. Click here to see it.)

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About: Seattle Spin is a weekly email newsletter highlighting the best restaurants, activities, and venues in Seattle this particular week Contact: Publisher: Gerard Wirz; Editor: Nathaniel Hollywood; Contributors:  Mike Ford and Mary Novak .