but obviously the word wanted here is obviate, to make obvious.
*chuckle*. nice one, ron.
but seriously... that word seems to cause a considerable deal of confusion in that it often can't necessarily be defined by context; eg: "The customer left the service bay in a huff, threatening lawsuit and spewing venom as to the ineptitude of the mechanic who'd left oily footprint stains on his leather, obviating a telephonic customer satisfaction survey."
it just seems to be a strange word, but i still use it often because i can't think of a suitable non-phrase alternative.
oh, and at the risk of causing general panic by returning the thread to its origin, Rubrick used the word "Hallowe'en" the other day, and i've never seen it spelled that way. where does the contraction come from? (apologies if this is a yart; i'm about 3000 threads behind these days)
