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sartorial storm with her French Open outfit. She took to the court Sunday in a self-designed outfit that looked like a cross between a Frederick's of Hollywood nightie and a cancan costume. Underneath the lacy black and red getup, she wore a pair of underwear carefully matched to her skin color -- just like the pair she wore earlier this year at the Australian Open, and that inspired speculation about whether she had gone commando. This latest fashion choice made for quite the photo opportunity and sent her name flying to the top of Google's hottest searches. I might congratulate Williams on her attention-getting abilities -- only, it's her otherrnal decibel levels. So much so that I was recently able to observe with an attitude of bemused sympathy, in a laboratory setting, as other people snored. At Georgetown Hospital's sleep laboratory in Washington, a 42-year-old named Antonio Go is kind enough to let me watch him sleep while hooked up to electrodes. At 9 p.m., three other patients show up to have their sleep monitored. Everyone has bags under their eyes. To get in the mood we watch a videotape called "Rise and Shine," in which an amiable slob named Todd keeps falling asleep at board meetings and bridge games. Everyone thinks it's a hoot except his wife. Why is he so sleepy? Unbeknownst to him, Todd sleeps poorly in bed -- he snores and chokes and rumbles and turns through the night while his long-suffering wife clenches her teeth. Finally his wife drags him to a Marcus Welby lookalike who puts him on a device called a CPAP -- continuous positive airway pressure -- a compressor attached to a mask worn over the nose that forces a stream of air into the respiratory canal. It works, and in no time Todd is vigorously trimming the hedges in the afternoon, instead of napping. The video was produced by Respironics, a CPAP manufacturer that touts its own products. But the hospital's dip into commercialism does not seem to bother Antonio. On the other hand, the fact that the required mask is reminiscent of "Silence of the Lambs" is not lost on him. "It looks horrible," said Antonio. "I guess I would only use it at home." The cosmetic angle is important to Antonio, a medical technologist who happens to work in Georgetown's hematology lab. He's a fitness buff who doesn't drink or smoke and looks about 30. Two years ago he had laser surgery to correct his eyesight. Then he thought he could lose the snoring as well, which was first brought to his attention at youth hostels in Europe two decades ago. "After doing surgery, my eyesight is 20-20. I'm enjoying life not having glasses. So I thought this is another aspect of my life -- I thought maybe I could get rid of my snoring. It's embarrassing. When I'm with my friends, they always say it's terrible if I fall asleep first because it's like thunder." He has also noticed he has to sleep nine hours a night and gets drowsy driving on the freeway. But it was only after his sister, a nurse in San Jose, brought sleep apnea to his attention that he figured there was a medical justification for getting his snoring treated. Snoring is caused by loose tissue vibrating in the flexible canal between mouth and lungs, sort of like shingles whining in a gale. Being overweight or thick-necked aggravates the problem by increasing pressure on the canal, narrowing it and adding volume to the vibrations. If the airway becomes tight or inflamed enough, it closes entirely. The cutoff of oxygen is bad enough; if oxygen levels in the blood get low enough, the brain sends signals to kick the sleeper awake. This may happen hundreds of times a night, all of it forgotten in the morning. Not surprisingly, apneics often wake up sleepy with headaches. Cumbersome as it is, CPAP is the most effective treatment to stop apnea, if decongestants and a diet don't work. But Antonio is kind of hoping his HMO will authorize laser surgery, a $2,000 procedure to whittle away flab from the soft palate and uvula (the stalactite of flesh hanging above the tongue). Lisa Anarado, the technician who is busy pasting electrodes to Antonio's head, suggests that laser surgery often doesn't work. Not only that, but it hurts and can change the timbre of your voice. (James P. Kiley, director of NIH's National Center for Sleep Disorders Research, tells me that laser-assisted uvulopalatoplasty has "done more harm than good.") A new surgery called somnoplasty, in which radio waves are used to melt away flabby tissue, is promising but relatively untested and more expensive. After the sensors are attached, the wires are taped together in a ponytail-like bundle behind Antonio's head and jacked into the console. Anarado turns out the light and within minutes Antonio is very cooperatively rocking the house. He's like a child mugging for the camera, only he's doing it unconsciously. And noisily. Like thunder. In the room next door, Anarado and another polysomnographist, Kelly Knight, watch the needles jiggle across scrolls of graph paper -- monitoring brainwaves, eye movements, breathing, blood oxygen, chest, chin and leg movements. They stifle yawns. Their jobs keep them up all night watching others labor through sleep. Like all overnight workers, they have their own circ