WHAT’S HIP RIGHT NOW

By Kaylen Strench     12/1/15 5:34pm

TECH:

Tech Tats

In a phrase: The one tattoo that won’t break your father’s heart.

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Where to find it: Not available yet, but should be released in outlets in January. 

I’m a huge fan of tasteful tattoos, but I know they’re not for everyone — at least, not right now. That could begin to change, however, with the release of Chaotic Moon Inc.’`  newest crazy innovation. “Tech Tats” are badass looking temporary tattoos: The invisible base makes it look like you literally have a circuit board attached to your arm. 

The creators, however, claim that these tats have more going for them than just their aesthetic appeal. They say that eventually the tats might be able to replace large, hunky medical devices — or even your annual trip to the doctor. They also say that (somehow) the tats could hold all your personal info to improve your cybersecurity. I think the latter seems a bit far-fetched, but the former is pretty believable. It looks like the future could, in fact, be tatted-out. 

 

LIFESTYLE:

Undertaking LA

In a phrase: The “natural birth” for death.

Where to find it:  Currently the only service like this is in LA, but it’s a craze that should spread. 

Hundreds of years ago, people wanted to contract out the disgusting or extremely complicated things in their lives. For instance, women started giving birth in hospitals, not at home. If people needed furniture, they bought it at a store instead of making it themselves. Yet, in a weird twist, we’re now going backwards. With birth, with life(styles) and now, with death. 

That’s right, new funeral homes, such as famed Undertaking LA, are offering you the chance to prepare your dead relative for burial. They’ll come over and give you some pro tips, but essentially you, yes you, scrub down Mimaw’s corpse and take out her rotting organs. I understand the hands-on movement, I understand the intimacy of such an experience, but … can we just please agree, too far?

 

FOOD:

Piecaken

In a phrase: It’s self-explanatory.

Where to find it: Pinterest. It’s everywhere on Pinterest.

The glorious trend of stuffing food into other food continues. We started with turducken: a deboned chicken stuffed into a deboned duck stuffed into a deboned turkey. That was incredible, but it is time for it to step aside for the real star of the holiday feast: the piecaken.

The piecaken is a gigantic cake stuffed with three — yes three — types of pie stuck together (It seems like it would fall apart otherwise) with butter and iced all over. It usually consists of the classic trifecta: apple, pumpkin and pecan. But creatives across the web have explored other mouth-watering combinations, such as chocolate, Oreo and butterscotch pie. It’s gigantic, it’s adaptable and it’s heavenly delicious. Must we ever eat anything else, for the rest of our lives?

 

BOOKS:

All American Boys

In a phrase: Young adult fiction gets real.

Where to find it: Bookstores, amazon.com. 

Young adult fiction is known for addressing cultural issues such as race, class and gender. (Didn’t we all have to read Sherman Alexie’s “The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian”?) Still, it typically doesn’t take it on as directly as Jason Reynolds’ and Brendan Kiely’s “All American Boys.” 

The novel takes on the intersection of police brutality and race through the perspectives of two high schoolers, centering in on an incident involving one of the students, Rashad. After Rashad is wrongly suspected of shoplifting and assault and is unjustly beaten by police, his life begins to crumble around him. The authors, who have written many other books independently, said they came up with the idea after they shared a room during the George Zimmerman trial and had many conversations about the obvious issues presented by the case. Though the book is considered young adult fiction, I think this is one many plain old regular adults could probably benefit from reading.

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