somnolent
SOM-nuh-luntadjMeaning sleepy and drowsy; ready to doze off
Memory hook SOMN = sleep: drowsy on the train. On the long ride home, Rosa’s head keeps nodding toward her shoulder, and her eyes won’t stay open: she is somnolent.
The somnolent passengers dozed as the train rocked along.
In context By the third hour of the meeting, the room had grown somnolent: heads drooped, eyes closed, and someone began, very softly, to snore.
Similar sleepy, drowsy, dozy
Opposite alert, wide-awake
From Latin somnolentus, from somnus (sleep).