Adult and Community Education of Martha’s Vineyard (ACE MV) will have its second annual benefit celebrating Island diversity and culture on Nov. 19 from 5 to 9 p.m. at the regional high school.

Holiday Gift Show

Got those Black Friday blues? Never fear, there’s no reason to go off-Island and get involved in that mad commercial scramble. But no need to sit home giftless with a long list to fill, either.

Today, Nov. 18, Featherstone in Oak Bluffs opens up its annual holiday gift show. The event takes place from 7 to 9 p.m. tonight and then continues throughout the weekend from noon to 4 p.m. on Saturday and Sunday.

Coco’s Wreaths

Corinne de Langavant, aka MVTV’s Coco the clown, is selling fresh wreaths to offset the costs of a special-needs presentation she plans to give at a New York city conference. De Langavant’s show, Coco and the Kids, uses art education to help people dealing with autism.

Susan Savory, a woman whose name speaks to time in the kitchen, spends her days cooking up a different sort of delectable. Ms. Savory is in charge of the children’s books at the Bunch of Grapes Bookstore. Her title may be manager of kids’ books, or something to that effect, but that seems so corporate a moniker when describing someone who so embodies her work she appears almost like a character in a children’s book herself. Perhaps Fairy Godmother of Little People’s Literature might be closer to the mark.

Strong characters with Russian accents, a story line set in an era unfamiliar to teenagers, an elaborate set design with complicated lighting cues and music that covers the waterfront — it’s no wonder the high school drama department started work on this play last spring.

But they did and the hard work was evident at Chess the Musical, which opened last night at the high school Performing Arts Center and shows again tonight and on Sunday this weekend.

For those easily intimidated by pie making there is a simple home truth; find someone who has mastered the art, and buy a pie from that person. For many an Island household, Eileen Blake, of Eileen Blake’s Pies, was that go-to expert for nearly 40 years.

Lasell Aids Habitat

Sixteen students and one faculty member from the sophomore honors leadership class of Lasell College in Newton will travel to the Vineyard on Nov. 19 to work on a project for Habitat for Humanity of Martha’s Vineyard.

Habitat is currently building the first of three houses at Bailey Park Road in West Tisbury, and the Lasell students will assist with the project in a variety of ways, from hands-on building to work on inventory.

Beginning Wednesday, Nov. 16, the Bourne Bridge was reduced to one-lane traffic for ongoing steel repairs.

Traffic delays will be likely during the morning and afternoon peak travel periods each day, according to the Corps of Engineers. Traffic control will be in place for the duration of the repairs.

The Bourne Bridge will be fully open to two lanes of traffic in each direction during the Thanksgiving holiday weekend, from Wednesday, Nov. 23 at noon through Monday, Nov. 28 at 9 a.m.

Alcoholics Anonymous

Information: 508-627-7084.

All meetings are nonsmoking.

Sunday, 6:45 a.m., open discussion meeting, First Baptist Church, William street, Vineyard Haven.

Sunday, 10 a.m., open discussion, State Beach, first bridge, Oak Bluffs, (weather permitting).

Sunday, 11 a.m., open discussion meeting at the Council on Aging on Wamsutta avenue in Oak Bluffs.

Sunday, 7 p.m., grapevine meeting at old Oak Bluffs School, School street, Oak Bluffs.

There are times when I receive a bird sighting from individuals that I morph into a person resembling a detective. I proceed to grill the bird-watcher in a similar fashion to an investigator questioning a perpetrator of a suspected crime. So how do you think I felt when I heard that Tim Rich, the past chief of police of Chilmark, had reported an immature red-headed woodpecker at his Chilmark feeder?