A little rantette.

Tesco, which is British supermarket, has sent me a special offer: sweetcorn cobbettes at fifty pence off.

Cobbettes?

But what on earth...actually, come to think about it, I think I know what a cobbette is. I think it's half a cob. Tesco sells sweetcorn like that.

I don't know why, but there it is.

But, you know something?  If I wanted to buy my cobs chopped in half, then discovering that they are called cobbettes would make me change my mind.

Because nothing that ends -ette is classy, cool, or covetable.

Caravanette, laundrette, cigarette, leatherette, maisonette...

Even brunette is faintly patronising, now I come to think about it.

Yes, okay, there are some useful words where the -ette doesn't imply dinky, such as casette, omelette, and silhouette, and there are a few where being small isn't necessarily a bad thing, as in marionette and silhouette, but on the whole -ette words are a poor sad bunch.

And if for some reason I should hanker after a half-sized cob, I shall take a cleaver to it.

As I suggest Tesco does to the word cobbette.

Word To Use Today: one that doesn't end in -ette!

PS Why on earth is there an extra b in it?