For 13 years Utah County Assessor Ron Smith has received telephone bills with occasional calls to Ibapah, Utah, a small town about 40 miles south of Wendover.
Why Ibapah? Smith says he doesn't know a soul in the town just west of the Great Salt Lake Desert on the Nevada border.Smith has seen this call on his bill at least annually, and the other day he finally solved the mystery.
He has seven children between 3 and 13 years old, and any curious youngster can't help but pick up the phone and dial 1-234-5678, as well as 9 and 0.
Guess where the call gets you? Ibapah, Tooele County.
"We get calls like that all the time," said one US WEST operator, from puzzled parents wanting to know who lives in Ibapah.
The operator said the easily dialed number used to be residential but was changed after the person on the other end tired of hearing giggly voices and then a click and dial tone.
Now the man who manages Beehive Telephone in western Utah uses the line to entertain children from throughout the state with a recording he changes periodically.
The latest recording talks of trade shows, cartoons, work at the South Pole, cold fusion and a vacation to Russia. You should try calling sometime, but don't forget you made the call.
It's stories like this that I'll miss when I move up to Salt Lake City in two weeks. For a place that has that small-town feeling, there is always something unusual going on in Utah County.
I laugh when people ask me if there is enough news to cover in the valley - enough news to keep five staff writers, a photographer and a receptionist busy. We could use some help, too.
Despite what some people believe, the state doesn't end at Point of the Mountain.
Things are definitely not boring in the county. The past months I have covered the County Commission, education issues in the valley and happenings at Brigham Young University. Add to that the Olympics issue and its pertinence to Utah Valley, among other topics which are too many to list, and it can keep you going night and day.
It definitely hasn't been dull writing about the commissioner who fired his secretary because "she was too friendly." The backbiting that went on among commissioners in the aftermath was a joke.
Working with three commissioners with three very different personalities and agendas made life exciting. It's too bad they didn't get along better because they probably could have accomplished a lot more in office.
And, of course, I can't forget to point out the commission's own minute man, Sid Sandberg, for his meticulous perusal of meeting minutes. I wonder if he really wanted to be an English teacher rather than a lawyer and county commissioner? The commission clerk became so paranoid about making sure her t's were crossed that she had an English teacher and five others look at the minutes before they came before commissioners for approval.
Covering cold fusion at BYU and specifically the interesting antics of physicist Steven Jones has been fun. His views on fusion seem to be a burr under the saddle for two certain electrochemists at the University of Utah.
Prayer at school graduation ceremonies, the teacher walkout and the threat of a strike kept education a hot topic to cover, and probably the most exhilarating for me.
Life in the Utah County Bureau has indubitably been an adventure I'll miss, but I'm looking forward to my move to the Church News, where hopefully life will bring new-found peace. By the way, if you notice bylines, I'll be sporting a new last name by that time. Sheridan R. Sheffield will have you covered in the Church News! A lot can happen in a few days, you know.
(Sheridan R. Hansen has been a staff writer in the Deseret News' Utah County bureau.)