RAT

[G S C]

Local Sunday newspaper, the _Sunday Patriot-News_, had an article in
which a RAT program was mentioned.  RAT = remote administration tool.
Led me to recall a conversation that I'd heard several years ago.

While driving my daughter and some of her friends to a movie, sometime
in the early 1990s, one of the girls mentioned something (to the other
girls) about a rat, as in:  "She (another girl) came to school without
her rat."  Some other questions and comments were made about the rat.
Later, I asked my daughter what-the-devil they were talking about.
Found out that in their language, rat = tampon, feminine hygiene
product.

Is the word 'rat' used elsewhere with a similar meaning (tampon)?  Don't
know if high school students in the Hershey area still use the term or
not.

If the word was discussed earlier, and is in the archives, no need to
send a "hey, dummy" message.  The word 'archive' will be sufficient to
initiate my 2nd search of the archives.  [I've looked in the archives,
but didn't find the above usage.]

George S. Cole   gscole at ark.ship.edu
Shippensburg University