Shira Barlow... the name doesn't ring a bell, right? But her phone sure has been ringing like crazy since she's got Paris Hilton's old phone number. How on Earth did this happen?

Well, the story begins on this year's Valentine's Day, when UCLA student Shira was in a West Hollywood bathroom stall. She had the telephone in her back pocket, and under some pretty presumable circumstances, the mobile phone fell in the toilet. So she got a new one, and the telephone company assigned her a new number. Well, not exactly. For you see, with so many people changing their numbers, the phone companies are trying to minimize area-code splitting. So they are recycling used phone numbers, such as Paris Hilton's old number.

And that is the exact phone number that was given to Shira. Now a lot of people out there that have that number are unaware that Paris isn't using it anymore. And when I say "a lot" I'm not kidding around. Therefore, you already have a good idea of what happened next.

Shira noticed something weird going on just three days after the bathroom incident. That's because Paris' birthday is on February 17. Shira's phone began ringing almost all the time and she received a lot of text messages. It seems that many male callers were trying to hit on Paris. When Shira informed them all that they were talking to a UCLA student, nobody would believe her.

Then Paris went to jail. Therefore, calls and text messages like "where's the party?" or "hey baby girl" were replaced by even more expressing sympathy. After Paris was released, Shira found herself on the receiving end of more messages that flared the horrible ordeal that she was subjected to.

Being Paris Hilton on the phone also has its perks. Shira received many invitations to exclusive parties, but she did not use them. Instead she used the text messages to thank Paris' supporters.

Despite the constant hassle of having Paris Hilton's phone number, Shira Barlow has declared that for her it is a source of amusement and she does not want to change the number again.