Zzz-mail:Woman goes on-line - while asleep

Doctors have reported the first ever case of someone using the internet while asleep, after a sleeping woman sent emails to people asking them over for drinks and caviar. It was only when a would-be guest phoned the next day to accept, that she found out what she had done.

The 44-year-old woman, whose case is reported by researchers from the University of Toledo in the latest edition of medical journal Sleep Medicine, had gone to bed at around 10pm, but got up two hours later and walked to the next room.

She then turned on the computer, connected to the internet, and logged on by typing her username and password to her email account. She then composed and sent three emails. Each was in a random mix of upper and lower cases, not well formatted and written in strange language. One read: "Come tomorrow and sort this hell hole out. Dinner and drinks, 4.pm,. Bring wine and caviar only." Another said simply, "What the……." The new variation of sleepwalking has been described as "zzz-mailing".

The neurologists say that the behavior displayed by the woman was unlike common sleep walking; it involved complex movements and coordinated behavior like turning on the computer, typing in the correct login information and composing the emails.

Although the exact cause of the phenomenon is not completely comprehended, it is thought that the woman’s bizarre sleep walking incident could have been triggered by prescription medication.

Though simple sleep walking usually involves activities like sitting up on the bed while asleep, dressing up or even just dazedly walking around, cases of sleepwalkers playing musical instruments, painting, cooking and even driving a car have been reported.

It can also include strange and unusual behaviors which can be an annoyance to fellow tenants. A case was documented by researchers at the University of Minnesota where a husband would suddenly grab the buttocks of his wife, almost every night, for no apparent reason.

The writer would personally quote Sleep Medicine for every email he ‘accidentally’ sent, but it’s probably better to get fired for having rage-issues, rather than consistent sleep-insanity.