“Oh. My. God, Becky. Look at her butt. It’s so… TRENDY!”

Big butts are all the buzz this season.

It’s always amusing to me when body parts go in or out of style. Unlike your clothes, the body you’re given isn’t really something you can change all that much (at least not without thousands of dollars worth of surgery). So when some magazine declares that this year’s “look” is small breasts, or long necks, or attached ear lobes (OK, I’m joking about that last one) it all seems that much more ridiculous. How can people go out of style? And what are you supposed to do if you don’t have this year’s hot shape? Stay inside until the trend changes? Clothes go out of style; people do not.

And yet…

Apparently this year’s big trend is already behind us. So to speak:

Make way! Big bums are shaping up to be the summer of 2010’s hottest trend.

Serena Williams reveals that it took her years to accept her curvy backside, joining other full-figured celebrities embracing their broader bottoms this beach season.

Kim Kardashian says she finally appreciates her round rear. Madonna’s daughter Lourdes loves shorts that make your butt look big. And a new book celebrates bulging booties.

Not since Sir Mix-a-Lot’s 1992 hit “Baby Got Back” has so much praise been paid to the posterior.

The book mentioned in the article is The Big Butt Book, a 372-page salute to well-endowed posteriors.

This is great news for me, since I tend to carry my weight in my hindquarters. Now instead of admitting that I’m just too lazy to go to the gym I can say I’m being trendy! Hooray! If you’re not lucky enough to have some extra junk in your trunk, you can always fake it with padded panties or butt-lifting jeans. Or you can just wait until next season when inevitably slim hips will come back into style.

But it’s not all fun and games for us fat-bottomed girls. A new scientific study has found that women who carry extra weight around their hips may suffer memory impairments. The study found that “apple” shaped women, or women who carry weight in their middle, scored higher on cognitive tests than “pear” shaped women:

The study involved 8,745 post-menopausal women aged 65 to 79.

These women were asked to complete a memory test that doctors use to judge brain function. They were also weighed and measured, then scored on an obesity scale known as Body Mass Index or BMI. Over two-thirds of the women were overweight or obese.

The researchers found that for every one point increase in a woman’s BMI, her memory score dropped by one point.

And pear-shaped women – those with smaller waists but bigger hips – scored particularly poorly.

The researchers say this is likely to be related to the type of fat deposited around the hips versus the waist.

So enjoy your moment in the sun, my fellow pears. Someday we won’t remember the short time when we were fashion’s big trend. But at least we can rest assured that Sir Mix-A-Lot and Queen will always love us.