"sleep gay"?

[Laurence Horn]

Today's NYT Science section contained several letters in response to
last Tuesday's previously discussed piece on "brokeback marriages"
(he gay and closeted, she straight and unsuspecting, shit hits fan).
One of the letters (not the one from our town councilwoman) contains
the following passage:

"When black men sleep gay and marry women, news stories focus on the
''down low'' aspect and the devastating effect of AIDS on black
women. Your article focused on the love gay men have for their wives
(even though many also maintain boyfriends on the side)."

Being totally unfamiliar with the collocation "sleep gay" (= 'engage
in same-sex sex'), which combines an extended euphemism with some
interesting syntax (note the non-parallel with, say, "sleep naked"),
I tried tracking it down on Nexis (major papers, all dates), and sure
enough this is the first actual hit for either "sleep gay", "sleeping
gay" or "slept gay".  There didn't appear to be any relevant google
hits, but I confess I didn't check out the several hundred largely
unparsable sequences of this type.  Does this represent a new
construction, or just one emerging from the collocational closet?

Larry

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