In re The Rat:  I know that The Rat was not fine food.  But the whole time I was an Undergraduate, I was working at least 20 hours a week.  Which really cut into my socializing.  So, typically a visit to The Rat was the result me standing around listening to a group of fellow students talk about what to do after class.  Someone would always suggest, "Let's go to The Rat."  And if I had some free time before work, I would join them, just like I was part of the group.  And they treated me like I was part of the group.  So for me, my memories of The Rat are golden.  But I could never afford a "Double Gambler" until years later, when I was in town, as an adult, for a meeting.  And I learned the "Double Gambler" was not a treat that I missed out on, but something altogether different that I had been spared from.
Some of my part time jobs while at UNC:  Night/Evening/Weekend Orderly at Gravely Sanitorium, clerk at The Cadesus Book Store at the Med School, Memo Machine Operator/office boy for the NC Symphony--back wheni it was still in three connected trailers, snd gas pumper at Walker's Gulf, etc.