Sleep Suits

(image courtesy of blogitecture)

It has been brought to my attention, in lieu of the whole sleeping security guard thing, that there is actually a suit that people can wear that can allow them to sleep wherever they so desire (thank you for making me aware of this subject, Corey Abramson). To clarify: No, the security guard mentioned in the previous post was not wearing a sleep suit. If he was, that would have instantly made his actions unjustifiable, as then he would have had the full intention of sleeping on the job. But this sleep suit raises the question itself: What the hell are these things and are they justifiable?

According to blogitecture, these suits were inspired by Buckminster Fuller's (I wish my name was Buckminster) practice of Dymaxion Sleeping. Dymaxion Sleeping, in a nut shell, is when you take four 30-minute maps during the span of 24 hours rather than the typical 8 hour sleep schedule normal people engage in. Dymaxion Sleeping is dubbed more efficient (well no shit, Sherlock, you're only asleep for 2 hours a day instead of 8), but there is lacking a sort of "ritual" prior to going to bed. There's no huge ordeal of getting ready for bed when you're only sleeping a half hour at a time.

Enter the Sleep Suit. The Dymaxion Sleeper's dream ( heh heh. Sleeper's dream. Get it? Do you even dream when you're only asleep for 30 minutes? I digress...). Before the sleep suit, when these people tried to get ready for bed, their preparation to get ready to settle into a bed took about as long as the sleep itself. What people are saying about this sleep suit is that it provides Dymaxion Sleepers with a mini-ritual by putting this eye-sore of a suit on (instead of brushing your teeth, flossing, getting into pajamas, etc), while allowing them the flexibility of being able to sleep wherever they wanted. Instead of going home or crashing at a friend's place every 4 hours, just slip this bad boy on and you're good to go wherever, whenever.

A lot of research went into this thing, too. They even went as far as to test in in four , count 'em, FOUR positions to determine whether the material was sufficient: laying down face up, laying down face down, laying down sideways, and sitting at a desk. Once they figured out where the most support was needed, they produced these suits, patent pending of course.

Honestly, my first reaction if I saw someone laying in the middle of a grass patch on campus somewhere would be to give them a swift kick to the head. I don't care what that suit is made out of, it sure as hell wont supply the wearer with much cushioning as far as a roundhouse kick to the face from yours truly is concerned. Come on people! There is some sort of natural reason that, as humans, we sleep for long periods of time. This Dymaxion Sleeping, while it does sound like it has its benefits, does not sound like anything at all healthy. Can you imagine operating on only 2 hours of sleep a day? There's no possible way that's healthier for you than a full night's sleep, as it's not your natural sleep cycle! Isn't it essential for us to have our sleep cycles the way they are in order to get our daily dose of R.E.M. sleep? Taking 30 minute naps would not allow our bodies to get to this point in the sleep cycle. I don't like the sounds of it.

HOWEVER! This sleep-cycle talk has nothing to do with the subject of justification: the sleep suit. The sleep-suit is just a great enabler, encouraging people to partake in Dymaxion Sleeping. These sleep suits probably are only going to be used to by Dymaxion Sleeping enthusiasts, as a normal sleeper would have no good reason to own one of these, much less use one. I just don't see the point of these sleep suits. Imagine you're a college student at, say, Temple University, and you want to take a 30 minute nap between classes. What kind of a position are you putting yourself in here? You trap yourself in this cocoon to take your nap, so you're vulnerable to about anything imaginable. You're stuff could be stolen, you could be kidnapped, I mean, come on! You can't get up to run away because you'll be all tangled up in your goddamned sleep suit! The only stuff that would be safe is what's in your pants pockets, because there's no chance whoever is harassing you can work their way through the suit to your pocketries (yeah, that's a word now).

Ok, I'm aware people don't usually get robbed in broad daylight on the middle of a college campus, but as the sleep suit works as an enabler for Dymaxion Sleepers, it also acts as an enabler for pranksters. I mean really, I even said myself the first thing I would do if I saw one of these is kick whoever was in it. All it does is draw attention to yourself, and you're asleep. That can't be a good combination. So when it comes down to it, the sleep suit is downright UNJUSTIFIABLE. That is all.

VERDICT: UNJUSTIFIABLE