Bill Mitchell 

The former Softie’s Fremont-based startup, Picobrew—which sells gear for home brewers—keeps raking in investment dough, including a recent $10.6 million infusion. Cheers to that.

Malala Yousafzai 

Shot at 15 for speaking out about girls’ education in Taliban-controlled Pakistan, she now has an even wider audience. That’s bullet proof. (Alaska Airlines Arena, July 24)

Charlo Greene 

The pot activist who quit her news reporter job live on air shares info about legal weed—but not rash decision making—at the Imperious Cannabis Business Expo. (Tacoma Dome, July 20 & 21)

Gollum 

Master says tricksy Seattle Symphony will play the Fellowship of the Ring’s score while the movie plays on the big screen. We wants to go, we does! (Benaroya Hall, July 15–17)

Ken Griffey Jr.

Surprising exactly no one, the Kid was a near-unanimous first-ballot inductee to the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame. He’ll be enshrined July 24—wearing his hat backward, we hope.

Yoky Matsuoka 

She won a MacArthur Foundation “genius” award in 2007 while developing a bionic arm at UW. Now she’s got a big gig at Apple, no doubt bringing us one step closer to the singularity.