Nigel Jarrett casts a cultured eye over the next few weeks to help you plan your days and nights out

THIS month we are interpreting 'culture' in its widest sense by recommending an entertaining lunchtime session on the differences between the sexes.

Author Allan Pease will be at Blackwood Miners Institute on September 24, telling us why men leave the lavatory seat up and women can never resist looking into a shop window.

A leading authority on body language and communication, Pease has devised a hilarious 75-minute survey of what makes us tick, based on the idea that male and female brains are 'wired' differently.

His talk starts at 12.45pm and is sure to be a hoot, not to say controversial - box office 01495 227206.

The sexually voracious Mrs Chater in Tom Stoppard's play Arcadia has Lord Byron and his friend hovering around her with intent, until her husband finds out.

When everyone thought Stoppard had done just about everything with elusive language on the stage, he came up with this work in 1993, a mix of detective story, rural rhapsody and comic celebration.

It opens at the Bristol Old Vic on September 17 and runs for almost a month.

The Old Vic is a theatrical institution and can be found in King Street near the floating harbour by reaching the city on the M4 and M32 - box office 0117 987 7877.

International Welsh dance company Diversions offers a double bill by two Wales-based choreographers at Abergavenny borough theatre on September 21.

One work is inspired by night-time photographs of the Welsh Valleys and the other by sci-fi movies of the 1950s.

It's a case of one art feeding off others to great advantage - box office 01873 850805.

Welsh National Opera is gearing up for its move to the Wales Millennium Centre with a nostalgic last season at the New Theatre, Cardiff, its home since it was founded.

Richard Strauss's Ariadne auf Naxos, a spectacular combination of comic and tragic as a nobleman's plans for two separate operas have to be combined, opens in a new production tonight, with further performances on September 17 and 25 - box office 029 2087 8889.