Office organizers with style and a green streak should take a look at a new line of goods from design giant Herman Miller: The Teneo storage system was designed by Ayse Birsel and Bibi Seck (Birsel was just honored by the prestigious Rhode Island School of Design) and has earned the Silver “Cradle to Cradle” eco-certification, partly thanks to the recyclability of most of its components. Designed in modules that can be combined to fit the storage needs of workspaces both large and small, Teneo lets users decide how many shelves, drawers and mini-closets they want. It also offers a pleasing array of surface materials — from metal and wood veneer to felt and cork — and encourages customers to mix and match using an online Color Tool to visualize choices. Pricing varies, depending on finishes and options; a thorough price breakdown can be downloaded here. Teneo is availabe through Herman Milller dealers; to find a dealer in your area, enter your state or Zip code here.

I’m always a little wary when a handbag designer launches a “for Target” line, because no matter how adaptable-for-the-masses the styles might be, the necessity of using cheap materials to keep the costs on “Target” kind of spoils the package. Devi Kroll’s line was likable, but way too pleathery, and when “for Target” is emblazoned on Loeffler Randall’s handbags, the intent of finding something chic on the cheap is defeated. But the megastore has managed to pique my interest again with a promising line from Botkier. I’ve been stalking Botkier bags on eBay ever since my fashion-mag editor friend came home with a teal leather satchel two years ago. The strategically studded hardware and the delicately laced fringe are the perfect yin and yang, a winning combination of tough and chic. The flagship label’s fall 2008 collection showcases fluttery fringe, burnished metallics, and the signature Botkier hardware juxtaposed against buttery, rumpled leather, which I totally heart. Botkier’s incarnation of for-the-people couture (at a tenth of the couture price) actually manages to spark some style possibilities. The crackled patina of the gold hobo (pictured) blurs the line between real and PVC, and for $50, I don’t have to stalk it on eBay. A fuchsia bucket bag ($40) deftly approximates patent leather in a shape and style that’s a cookie-cutter version of some top-of-the-line models. The white python-patterned hobo ($40) may even prove to be a better alternative to leather - easier to clean or at least less painfully costly to replace than the real thing. That said, not all styles hit the mark: A too-plastic- looking black satchel falls short, and a shimmery-rose wristlet is nothing special. But with some careful editing (and removal of those Target-logo-shaped charms), Botkier’s new line could offer up some winners.

Given the number of times some records have been reissued in the CD era €” the new editions of Blondie’s Parallel Lines and Elvis Costello’s This Year’s Model are, what, the sixth or seventh? €” it’s startling that the early years of U2, the off-and-on biggest rock band on Earth, are only now getting the deluxe reissue treatment. Boy, October and War were all just released in $35 hardbound packages combining the remastered original album with a second disc offering live tracks, remixes and B-sides. Though the discs are available everywhere (and, happily, are also available as single-CD $11 budget titles without the bonus tracks), Amazon is offering a brand-new exclusive boxed set, which features a bonus limited-edition poster and room for a fourth disc to come €” maybe a new version of the Under a Blood Red Sky EP, which was the most successful live record in British history?

As hard as it is for a sports-hating, small-town refugee to admit, Friday Night Lights is one of the best shows on television in recent years. Anchored by a rock-solid performance by Kyle Chandler, who plays a high-school football coach with a steadfast sense of right and wrong that resonates with viewers in a powerful, old-fashioned way. It’s one of those shows that over time makes you care about characters you hate passionately at first (like Taylor Kitsch’s drunken, sometimes mean Tim Riggins) and worry sincerely about the fate of others, like the tender-hearted quarterback whose sudden success threatens to change him completely. In the second season, just released on DVD (and a bargain, offering 15 episodes for the price of one feature-length movie), the screenwriters take some drastic measures in an apparent attempt to draw viewers: Within the first couple of episodes we get a killing and a cover-up on one hand, a life-threatening scam on another, and intimations of sex scandals down the road. All of which are too extreme to fit the mood Lights has established, but the season stays aloft thanks to actors who’ve earned our trust and our faith that the show will recover from the writer’s strike. In other TV series discoveries, the justly praised Mad Men is now out on both standard DVD and Blu-ray €” a glossy and increasingly mysterious look at Manhattan’s corporate world circa 1960. Less famous but worth comedy fans’ time are two British TV series, Black Books and the cult item Spaced, whose casts and sensibilities will be familiar to fans of Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz.

The recent Jack Black/Mos Def comedy Be Kind Rewind just hit video stores, overflowing with love for movies that are handmade, technically challenged or just plain weird. The Internet is kind to movies like that, supplying enthusiasts with corners devoted to every kind of oddball cinema. Take Onar Films, for instance, which specializes in Turkish films. There, a subspecies of cult movie takes (ahem) liberties with American icons, as in a Turkish Superman that’s so shoddy the planet Krypton is obviously represented by a Christmas ornament. On these shores, tiny video companies develop specialties of their own. Synapse has a line of the Japanese sex-and-swordplay Pinky Violence films that influenced Kill Bill; Mondo Macabro digs up Indonesian oddities like Mystics in Bali, where a disembodied head goes flying around in search of victims; and Dark Sky releases tons of “drive-in” fare like this Del Tenney collection that contains the screen debut of the late Roy Scheider. (Beware: Fig around these sites and you’ll find all sorts of lurid, gory, potentially offensive movies €” which is what you’re looking for, right?) Inching into the mainstream movie biz are indie black-comedies like the John Waters TV series ‘Til Death Do Us Part and the undead mockumentary American Zombie. Most in keeping with Be Kind’s happy do-it-yourself theme, though, is the delightful anthology The Animation Show (pictured), in which Mike Judge (King of the Hill) and Don Hertzfeldt (Rejected) pick their favorite cartoons of the year, from scribbly yarns about overprotective guard dogs to meticulously morphing geometric compositions and video-game-appropriating samurai films.

As early as 2001, Rolling Stone’s famed critic David Fricke was asking of songwriter Alejandro Escovedo, “What does it take to make this man a star?” Evidently, the answer was Bruce Springsteen. On the weight of Escovedo’s rocking new record Real Animal, the Boss pulled him onstage at an April concert to sing Escovedo’s anthemic “Always A Friend”; before long, Dave Matthews booked him to open six tour dates, and Escovedo’s band was plugging the record on the late-night talk shows. Any time’s a good time for success, and the new album’s a great tour through a rock-n-roll life that has seen stints in New York’s dives, sunny California, and the hill country of Texas. But here’s hoping new fans also find their way to earlier records that range from achingly tender to booze-soaked and raucous. Those curious about the musical influences on Animal  might start with producer Tony Visconti, best known for his work producing some of David Bowie’s best records. A fresh glimpse of that era comes in Live Santa Monica ‘72, a long out-of-print concert album documenting Ziggy Stardust’s first tour of the U.S.; as it was originally recorded for radio broadcast, not by bootleggers, the audio quality is great €” a good thing, since in addition to a limited-edition CD the disc is also being released on 180-gram audiophile vinyl

Remember back when the compact disc was new? It was such a novelty, in fact, that you were as likely to have to go to an electronics dealer or a maverick toy store to get one, rather than your favorite record shop. Back then, a huge percentage of the CDs I saw for sale were classical music. Why? Because classical fans are serious about quality, and many will invest cash and risk new tech in the pursuit of high fidelity. So it’s a little surprising that it’s taken this long for operas to make an appearance on Blu-ray. Regardless, the Opus Arte imprint is now officially ahead of the curve, with a line of operas in high-def now being distributed through Naxos. Among their earliest releases are Mozart’s crowd pleaser The Magic Flute, under the direction of Sir Colin Davis, and Johann Strauss’s Die Fledermaus. Highbrow videophiles who don’t do opera are finding titles to suit them as well, with the occasional ballet like Swan Lake hitting the Blu-ray format, while historical costume dramas such as The Other Boleyn Girl and performance-heavy imports like Saawariya (an Indian musical take on a Dostoyevsky tale) trickle out slowly. Fans of experimental composition, sadly, may have to wait a bit: as with a new documentary chronicling Karlheinz Stockhausen’s elaborate Helicopter String Quartet, those works are still relegated to standard DVD.