#509 Not Obvious

So not long ago I used the word prima facie. Most people pronounce it Pryma Fayshuh. Others pronounce it Pray-muh Fey-shee. Or fey-shee-ee. It’s a Latin word that lawyers like to use. It means pretty much “on the face of it.” Or “at first view” or self-evident and obvious. Other people use it when they are trying to point out whatever it is they are talking about should be obvious. Even though using the term prima facie makes it not obvious because no one understands Latin anymore.
Prima Facie means it requires no proof or reasoning: That was a prima facie violation of the treaty. He prima facie cut me off in traffic. That sort of thing. I think prima facie sounds like a good name for a day spa that specializes in facials. Prima Facie Salon, for all your luxuriant face-gooping needs. It’s of passing interest that prima facie is actually findable in an ordinary dictionary. Many of our semi-Latin constructs have slipped out of those hallowed pages or are hard to find because actually they are two words at once. Try finding nose pick or butt scratch. Anyhow, I’m thinking if I was going to open a spa for female lawyers and lawyers wives I’d name it Prima Facie Salon. Your Obvious Choice. Especially since “salon” also means a place where people of intellectual distinction gather.
But the whole prima thing is kind of cool. Maybe we should try to get it back into ordinary usage. Using it in place of prime whenever possible. We kind of do already. The slang word “primo” harkened back to it’s Latin roots. That’s some primo weed, dude. So prima would be a short step. The restaurant serves prima beef. He is the Prima Poobah of the fraternal organization named after hunted-down-and-killed-animals-with-horns. That is a prima location for a business.
It would be fun. By the way, I heard the other day that Madonna used to be an opera singer before she hit the world of pop rock. Apparently, that was in her pre-Madonna phase. Oh yeah, prima donna. Is that an obvious joke or what?
America, ya gotta love it