Rose first doodled the character in 1985 on a napkin in a restaurant. He doodled a triangle-shaped child on the butcher paper covering the table. He doodled on anything at hand, from used stationery to the back of an envelope. Ross with cat whiskers doodled on his face by Rachel. Ohanian doodled the creature while bored in a marketing class. He always doodled in high school and was introduced to painting before going to university. Naturally, Pastis titled his doodled strips "Rat" after his title character.