Wolverine’s uncertain grammar and Pinball FX 2’s latest tournament

When you launch your ball on the Wolverine table in Pinball FX 2, Wolverine, who gained his mutant powers when he was bitten by a radioactive wolverine/badger, makes the following observation:

I’m the best there is at what I do, but what I do best isn’t very nice.

Well, that’s very interesting, Mr. Wolverine, and it sounds awfully tough the way you kind of growl it. But let’s take a closer look at your assertion. The implication is that you’re talking about the same thing in both clauses. I’m going to assume you mean something rather dire like “killing” or “eviscerating bad guys with unobtanium claws” or whatever. But grammatically, you’re on shaky ground. If we parse your comment, you’ve phrased it in such a way that you could be talking about two completely separate activities: “what you do” and “what you do best”.

Let’s say you’re a plumber. That’s “what you do”. But let’s say you have devoted your entire life to dancing the Macarena and you’ve gotten very good at it, moreso than any other activity or even your profession. That’s “what you do best”. They aren’t the same thing.

So I’m not understanding your quip, Mr. Wolverine. It doesn’t hold up under scrutiny. Without more context, it’s a non sequitur. Maybe Professor Xavier has someone teaching grammar classes in that X-Man school thing he runs. Look into it. Get Gambit to sign up, too. No one understands a word that guy says.

I only bring this up because the Wolverine table is the focus of the latest Pinball FX 2 tournament. Play the table at any time through October 14 and your score will be registered. You probably won’t win, but that’s not important. What matters is getting a higher score than your friends, and also adding your tournament score to your superscore, and thereby staying ahead of your friends. If you’re on my Xbox Live friends list, please ignore this post.