@simplymike, I participated in your contest last week where you had said you had gotten close to dolphinhood, and now you've reached it! Congratulations!

As for the two steemians I'm grateful to:

One of them is @cryptkeeper17. He had been helping newbies and hosted the first ever contest I took part in, when I was nearing my first month on Steemit and had still been struggling to earn a few cents with my posts. I didn't win the contest, but thanks to it I learned how fun and important these contests are for newbies to engage, and discover interesting content and people. Cryptkeeper17 also encouraged me to join @qurator, which I eventually managed to do, and am still very happy about. He also gave me my first @dustsweeper credits (I had known about Dusty at the time but still hadn't deposited any funds), and recently, when I told him I became interested in Steem Monsters, he unexpectedly gave me a lot of cards! :D I'm grateful for all the little pushes he has given me, be it on Steemit or Steem Monsters.

The other steemian is @danielsaori (one of the creators of Dustsweeper, though Dustsweeper still didn't exist when I first ran into him). I took part in his Steemit Comment Challenge only once and with no expectations at all. My entry didn't get many votes from other people (at the time, this was required to be able to have a chance to win first place), but Daniel had really liked my comment and picked it as the "judge's choice," and I unexpectedly won second place at the contest! This was the first contest I had ever won, and I got a 200 SP delegation for one week. I remember I jumped and had to double... triple check when I noticed the extra 200 SP in my account! It was amazing. Not only the SP delegation, but also knowing that an established user enjoyed what I - a newbie nobody - had written definitely boosted my motivation to continue steeming! I'll always remember that!

Thank you to the two steemians above, and thank you @simplymike for this contest, an interesting opportunity to say our "thank yous" :D .