off-topic: phone hangups

[I am Spartacus]

i know this is really off-topic, but i want to see if there are others 
in the kansas city area experiencing the same problem that i am.  about 
6 months ago i started receiving a couple of calls just about every day 
from what i believe are automated dialers of some sort.  when i picked 
up the phone and said hello, there was a brief 1-second pause (give or 
take) and then a click and the line goes dead.  annoying, but not 
horrible.  they only came during the day.  lately, like within the last 
2 months, i have been receiving about 8-12 of these every single day. 
 it's getting out of hand.  when i try to *69 the caller, i get the SWB 
friendly greeting "the number you have tried to trace is not available 
with these features".  no, i don't have caller-ID and i probably should 
get it.  i just don't use the phone that often and didn't want to bear 
the expense.

does anyone else have the same problem at their phone number?  is this a 
telemarketing thing i'm not aware of?  any clues would be appreciated, 
if for no other reason than to satisfy my curiosity.

thanks.

shannon merritt