If we're going to talk about summer, i should just say that i have been MISERABLE the past two days by being attacked by the worst hay fever ever (mobile phone predictive text = gay fever). My eyes were practically swollen shut on monday and itched like heck...add that to constant sneezing (8 in a row DOESN'T give you an orgasm) and i was not a happy bunny. But i digress...

Ten years ago this very day, 2 monumental things happened. One would have a huge impact on pop music, the other a huge impact on my life. On June 28th 1996, Ginger, Posh, Sporty, Scary and the other one did their first live British tv performance of Wannabe on GMTV. Now i have searched youtube for it, and can't find it sadly because if the video was marvelous in its dodginess then this was classic if only for poor Geri "I wasn't a natural dancer" halliwell doing some sort of karate kick dance for the camera. Of course they went on to have massive success that i won't bore you with writing about here cos its well documented. And certainly from 1996-1998 they totally ruled the world of pop selling more singles and albums than Girls Aloud could dream of.

Now I totally missed the summer of spice because on June 28th 1996, I flew off to new York to work at Rotary Sunshine Camp in Rochester. To say it was an experience that changed my life would be somewhat of an understatement. I had never worked with kids with disabilities before so coming to a camp run especially for them was somewhat of an eyeopener. AAnd luckily I loved it. Due to someone leaving (a hushed up pregnancy!) I was able to become Musical director for the camp and organise the evening entertainment and weekly play. It was incredibly frustrating, funny, rewarding and unforgettable all in one go. By the time the summer had finished, I had made some great friends, drunk far too much in the field across the road (really my first experience with binge drinking - not pretty. Once I was at a party for Tara Trojanowski's birthday that August, and decided to die my hair blonde. Some other drunk girls helped me and then said to wash it off in the shower. instead i passed out in the shower and was only discovered the next morning when the bleach had caused most of my hair to fall out! Mortifying!!), totally changed my music tastes (somehow before this summer i hadn't realised that there was music that people loved that didn't make the UK or US top twenty!) and made me change my career options from studying English to studying Disability policy - something i still do for work 10 years later. I could write millions of stories about that summer and the two more I went back for, as well as the countless trips i made after 1998 to keep up with friends. But thats for another day...

So i totally missed the summer of spice and came back to Gary Barlow having a solo number one, Robbie Williams doing some drugged up cover of Freedom and of course the Spice Girls ruling England. I didn't succumb to their charms until 2 Become 1 that Christmas and then loved them and got live the summer of spice when i went back to camp in June 1997 just as they were breaking the states...