Relief For Sleep Deprived Flyers

“Tonight I Sleep!”

The other day I was trying to read on a flight. But I couldn’t concentrate. I was in an aisle seat, and the guy in the aisle seat across from me was doing The Oil Well. You’ve no doubt seen this: someone is trying to sleep sitting upright. But their head slowly starts to fall fall forward. Then gravity kicks in and whips their head downward. The acceleration is beefy and concludes with a quiet grunt. Then the poor soul raises their head and starts the process all over again. That is, if his neck hasn’t broken.

I felt for this guy. After my second cross-country trip fighting against doing The Oil Well, I swore off red eye flights.

I timed how frequently the guy executed The Oil Well: two per minute. It started shortly after takeoff, which meant that for a five hour flight he was destined to drill down 600 times. Fortunately, his lower back decided to help his overworked neck by occasionally directing the guy to sleep with his head on the seat-back tray.

The obvious solution here is to hang hammocks over the aisle. But airlines don’t think of things like that. They’re too busy figuring out how to sell 120 tickets for a flight with 100 seats and make it work. So I’ve developed a DIY solution for the sleep-challenged.

You take a rectangle of Velcro and attach it to two hooks, which fasten to the top of your seat. Then you buy a simple wrestling headset and attach Velcro to the back. When it’s time to sleep you put the hooks in place, slap on the headset, and press your head backward. Basically, you Velcro your head to your seat.

Why use a cumbersome wrestling headset and not a simple headband? When you’re oil-welling as frequently and viciously as the guy across the aisle, a simple headband is bound to slip. Which could cause strangulation (admittedly a better outcome than oil-welling for five hours straight, but still).

The guy on my flight lucked out. He managed to log one hour straight on the tray table, thereby reducing his oil well count to only 480. He should be fine once he gets out of traction for his back.