"e-book?"

What a day I had yesterday! And I didn't blog about it immediately because I was on the phone for ages telling my sister and my boyfriend all about it!
The most exciting thing that happened yesterday was the BBC filming in Hay. They came into the shop in the morning, and spent some time upstairs with the antiquarian books - and a man in a straw cowboy hat and grey suit who was carrying a slimline electronic screen with him. It was the sort of thing pretty young yeomen on the Starship Enterprise were always handing Captain Kirk to sign, only less bulky.
Meanwhile, a chap came into the shop with a young friend. He'd last visited Hay 34 years ago, when there were only 2 bookshops, and he was showing his friend round, who hadn't even been born then. The man in the grey suit was in the entrance way when these two were about to leave, and they got talking while the e-book was demonstrated to them (with the BBC man rolling his eyes in the background, as they were supposed to be heading off to film somewhere else in Hay).
In the afternoon, they were back. By this time, it was bucketing down, and we do have a handy pavilion outside where they could film outside, but still in the dry. Deb was recruited as an extra, along with another lady. I could hear the BBC chap shouting instructions to them. "Look scared! Say 'e-book' as if you've never heard of one before. And hold it...."
After half a dozen takes, Deb managed to escape, and thrust me into the BBC's arms. "Your turn now!" she said, disappearing upstairs.
A family were sheltering from the rain and watching the filming, and they got involved as well. They got the gran to look out of the window and say "An e-book?" and then they got me to peer round the door. "E-book?"
"We'd like to do a bit of vox pop," the BBC chap said, and dragged off one of the ladies for a quick interview. We'd been standing in the background while the star of the piece, he of the grey suit, demonstrated his e-book to them. For around £400 you can carry something like 80,000 books around in the screen and a couple of computer sticks that fit in your pocket, and you can download anything from the Gutenberg Project for free (that's all the out of copyright books). You can even make notes on the 'page' with a stylus if you want to. Most impressive, and easy to read - but I don't think it'll make second hand books obsolete just yet. I said to one of the ladies, living in Hay is like living inside one of those e-books - you have more or less instant access to thousands of books, and you can keep and cherish them, or dip in and out of them, as you wish.
They had a find for the vox pop with the only man of the family. He was over from Italy, where he now lives, and he reads mostly comparative religion and Terry Pratchett - and he seemed very computer savvy. Being in Italy, he finds it difficult to get his hands on all the books he wants in English, so an e-book might be quite useful for him.
By this time, the two older ladies were getting tired of it all. "I hope they don't call us," they said. "Maybe we'll go back to the car - you can tell Chris where we've gone, can't you?" But before they managed to creep away, Chris was back - and the BBC were running out of time, so they were finishing up with the filming anyway.
After work, I let Islay out for her usual evening walk, and ran into them again, taking a few general shots of Hay. Islay was a great hit with them, and we just about got her to grin right into the camera lens for them, and then they asked me to walk down the street towards them with Islay, who co-operated beautifully.
It's going to be a 4 minute slot on the One Show, on BBC 1 on Thursday at 7pm.
Fame at last! (if I don't end up on the cutting room floor!)