The other day the Register ran an article suggesting that Samsung’s new laptops look a bit familiar. Similarly, John Gruber took a pop at Lenovo as they adopted a familiar form-factor with their new “ultrabook”.

The case for copying versus obvious design choices and its merits here can be debated and frankly I don’t care, but something struck me as interesting in both cases – the Windows laptop makers don’t want to show you Windows.

If you look at any of Apple’s product shots the screen is always showing something interesting – some photo editing, a video call, even just the Lion desktop in the case of the new MacBook Air. Macs never have a black screen. Conversely, Lenovo and Samsung’s product shots for the two new ranges linked above either hide the screen entirely or show it in the “off” position. Nothing there. Zilch A quick trip to HPs UK laptop page tells a similar story: rows of machines sporting a blue background with the HP logo.

It’s almost as if they’re ashamed of the software they have no choice but to ship on their machines.

The other day I saw this gem on twitter:

Anyone who says ‘nothing tastes as good as skinny feels’ does not know where to eat.

On the one hand, a very fine meal can indeed surpass the buoyed feeling of gentle elation one gets from feeling attractive. I’ve enjoyed such meals and they are better than sex, religion and adrenaline. There’s this sushi place in York I could just eat at until I explode or go broke or pass out; I once ate a steak somewhere in Cornwall that I didn’t shut up about for weeks.

In short, it’s a perfectly valid statement.

Now, I want to believe that the reason you’re a big tubber is because you enjoy a life of epicurean delight. You sample only the finest wines and cheeses, platters of exquisite chocolate truffles, the finest cigars, beef ravioli such as can make a grown man weep, consumed by the trough full. It’s not true though, is it? The reason you look in the mirror and weep buttery tears is more mundane: you’re stuffing yourself to the oily gills with utter crap. Cheap biscuits, noxious sugary cocktails, fist-sized hamburgers made from special offer bread and mechanically extracted meat, topped with a slice of elastic cheese.

Feeling thin and pretty may not match up to the joy of eating a perfectly prepared sirloin steak, but it knocks the shallow, fleeting delight of stuffing yourself with cheesy wotsits into a cocked hat.

Or at least that’s what I hear.

Pass the malteasers?

Look, I know there’s a word for that thing where there’s a buxom yet adorable model wearing a bikini top that’s two sizes too small. It’s probably Korean or something and the closest translation is “maximum cute times wondrous overflow”.

Whatever it is, just tell me so I know what magic glyphs to put into google image search and I’ll be on my way, alright?