Daytrippers

Seven things to do this week

TODAY Love is in the Airfield House in Dundrum, Dublin, where a St Valentine's soirée takes place tonight. Love Punch is a Fair Trade night out with organic booze, inspiring sounds and healthy snacks. The venue is five minutes from Balally Luas stop. Tickets cost €10 from the Cultivate Centre, Temple Bar. From 8 p.m. to 1 a.m. Call 01-6746415 for more information.

TOMORROW If you like your ballads but haven't come across the Dublin City Workingman's Band, get down to the Foggy Dew pub in central Dublin tonight. These five lads tackle everything from Black Is the Colour to Dirty Oul' Town and do a storming version of Fairytale of New York. Do not rule out dancing on tables. Begins at 6 p.m.

MONDAY If you want to get away from all that lovey-dovey stuff, maybe an edgy night out at the theatre would do the trick. Lonely Hearts - a jet-black comedy about sex and money, love and betrayal, deceit and cruelty - is inspired by a Parisian who placed an ad for a woman in the personal columns in 1914. Tom Hopkins (Christy from Fair City) leads a large cast. Civic Theatre, Tallaght, Dublin. Tickets €20, €16 concessions. Call 01-4627477 or visit www.civictheatre.ie.

TUESDAY If you haven't made it to our cultural capital yet, check out Fête de la Danse, which starts tonight in Cork, featuring contemporary dance from the francophone world. Videodanse will be a highlight, showing films from the dance-video library of the Pompidou Centre. All screenings are free. See www.instchordance.com.

WEDNESDAY Whelan's in Dublin welcomes back Mark Geary, the New York-based Dubliner who recently released his brilliant follow-up album, Ghosts. This is an intimate solo gig - with support by Emmett Tinley - and it's worth going along just to hear Geary singing You're the Only Girl to a pindrop-silent crowd. Tickets are €17.50, available at www.ticketmaster.ie. Doors open at 8 p.m.

THURSDAY It's not every day an e-novel is launched, so why not pop into the College Bar at NUI Galway at 6 p.m., where Rab Swannock Fulton is launching Transformation? There will be music, readings and refreshments. Entry is free, but donations are welcomed for Irish anti-war activists going on trial next month.

FRIDAY battle of the seXes is a quirky one-man show that's on tonight and tomorrow at Liberty Hall in Dublin. Intriguing performer reuBen doesn't speak on stage, uses no props or fancy costumes and yet plays dozens of characters who flirt outrageously with each other and break each other's hearts. Tickets are €21.50. See www.comedywithoutwords.com.