5 Fun NH Weekend Activities, Nov. 16-18

1. Luck be a lady! Guys and Dolls will be performed by the Bedford High School Theater Company all weekend. Before there was a book called Men are from Mars, Women are from Venus, there was a musical called Guys and Dolls that told us all we ever needed to know about the complex relationship between men and women. Set in the 1950s and based on the Broadway stories of Damon Runyon, this musical fable is sure to charm all ages. Audiences will enjoy watching the incorrigible gambler Sky Masterson sweep buttoned-up missionary Sarah Brown off her feet and off to Havana. They will laugh as schemer Nathan Detroit juggles both his floating crap game and his disapproving fiancée, Adelaide. So, roll the dice and don’t think twice about seeing Bedford High School Theatre Company’s production of Guys & Dolls!

2. Play the fiddle? Join the Fiddlin' Around Workshop at the Concord Community Music School tonight at 7 p.m. Open to fiddlers of all levels, these monthly workshops led by internationally known fiddler Lissa Schneckenburger will explore a variety of topics, including New England fiddling, Scottish fiddling, improvisation for traditional musicians, playing for dancing, and arranging. This workshop, "Learning By Ear," is for people who have never learned music by ear, or who want to get better at it. If you feel chained to the written notation and want to be free to learn tunes on the fly, in a jam session, or in an improvisatory setting, this is the class for you! We will start with some basic exercises to help you develop your ears, and then gradually build on those skills. Open to all instruments, all ages and all levels. Please come with an instrument, a recording device and a notebook.

3. Don't Blink! The Short Short Story Film Festival will be taking place at the New Hampshire Technical Institute Friday night from 6-10 p.m. The Short Short Story Film Festival celebrates brevity in filmmaking, featuring films from across the globe, lovingly harvested by the folks here at MergingArts Productions. Tickets just $5, on sale at the door. Free with NHTI ID!

4. Big laughs! Get ready for Stage One Dinner Theatre: Twice Around the Park at the Chateau Restaurant and Event Center in Concord on Friday. Two hysterically funny one acts. A Need for Brussels Sprouts finds a middle-aged actor hoping to land a TV commercial for pizza by playing opera full blast in his apartment while pretending to be the tenor. Enter the irate lady cop who lives upstairs and intends to give him a summons for disturbing the peace. They are both lonely and one thing leads to another. In A Need for Less Expertise, a couple whose marriage is on the rocks after 26 years has procured a self-help audiotape designed to improve their spiritual awareness, their health and their sex life as a last-ditch effort to save their marriage. Each encounter contains its quota of wackiness and broad satire.

5. For the kids! Author and storyteller Rebecca Rule will sign copies of her new children’s book, “The Iciest, Diciest, Scariest Sled Ride Ever!” at the Toadstool Bookshop in Milford Saturday afternoon. The book tells the story of seven children who set on a sledding adventure that soon soars to epic proportions. Rule infuses the story with her trademark wry sense of humor and authentic New England language. Award-winning illustrator Jennifer Thermes uses vivid watercolors to animate the winsome characters and joyful action, as the children slip, slide, and scramble their way up an icy slope to finally fly down the highest, mightiest, iciest sledding hill on Old Mountain Road.