[Heady]

I also have to say that I'm glad the mods are here and I'm glad they do the job they do. It's nice to be able to read at my normal speed without having grammatical mistakes or chat speak interrupt that flow. While I find smilies useful to convey the tone I'm using, I'm glad there is a limit of 3 because people would go nuts reading my posts spattered with smilies.

I've already made a few mistakes in my posts and I found it helpful to be called out on those mistakes. I don't understand what people mean by the pm thing but I still appreciate it when the mod will quote where I messed up and point out my mistake. It's the only way I'll learn.

When I first came here, I would read certain posts and feel that maybe people were too hard on those targeted, but really, it's similar to a parent scolding a child. It shouldn't have to be placated and I think they get the point across in a tough love sort of way. It's not personal, it's just how it is. And being straightforward like that allows other people to understand that the advice given was the wrong advice.

I can't imagine referring to any of my animals as "just a" anything. Really, nothing against you because some view animals differently than others, but if I welcome an animal into my home, that animal becomes my family and it is my goal to think and treat it as such. Even though some people view animals with the "just a" idea in mind, that doesn't necessarily always make them poor caregivers. My father-in-law is the perfect example of this where he does right by his animals, but at the end of the day, to him they are just animals.

I will admit, and some of you know, that I was doing the veggie thing all wrong and when I posted my concern about how to do it right, I received a lot of terrific advice that I am definitely going to follow. My issue wasn't that I wasn't feeding enough, but that I wasn't giving enough variety and thankfully people were willing to point that out to me and offer great advice on how to fix that. I completely understand the reasons and benefits of offering a bigger variety of vegetables now, so my next course of action is to remedy that today.

If someone on here points out that you're not doing something right or offers a way to better what you are doing, I would take the advice and go with it. When I read that you weren't very concerned about the vegetables because of the size of guinea pigs, it made me think of babies and children and how they tend to require more nutrients and a larger variety of nutrients than adults do. Since my animals are my babies, I think of them as such (even if they're old, they're still my babies) and treat them as such. Granted, the animal may be an adult, but since, throughout their lives, they rely solely on us to give them everything they need, then we step up and do that for them.

This is one of those forums that the advice given isn't the kind to take with a grain of salt. People know their stuff here and if they question what you, I, or anyone else does, it's with good reason and good intentions.