sleeps

1. 1
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present of sleep.

   She sleeps with the window open even in winter.

   The old dog sleeps most of the afternoon by the fire.

   Note

   Most uses of this form take no object: the baby sleeps, a quiet town sleeps under snow. One transitive use is worth knowing. A cabin or tent that sleeps six has beds for six people, and the number is its object. Take care with sleeps with someone, which usually reads as a euphemism for sex.

   The lakeside cabin sleeps six comfortably.

   The camper van sleeps two adults and a child.

2. 2
   noun

   Plural of sleep.

   The clinic compared the patient's sleeps across five separate nights.

   A string of poor sleeps left the whole team irritable by Friday.

   Note

   Only the countable uses of the noun take this plural. The state of rest itself has none, and neither does the gummy crust found in the eyes on waking. What gets counted is a single bout of sleeping, or, informally, a night measured by the sleep in it, as in counting the sleeps until a holiday. The same spelling is also the present-tense verb, as in she sleeps.

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