Chilkat Valley News - Serving Haines and Klukwan, Alaska since 1966

Twenty-four-year-old Alaskan Bryan Bryerson was scrolling through the dating app Tinder last week at two in the morning when he realized he personally knew everyone within the app’s maximum range.

“Well, that’s awkward.” Bryerson said.

The rural Alaskan town of 2,000 people that Bryerson lives in has just over a hundred user profiles on Tinder. “I just downloaded it.” Bryerson said. “Well, I mean, I had it before. But I deleted it. Then I downloaded it again.” Independent fact-checkers confirmed independently that Bryerson has deleted the app at least six times. “I never liked my profile picture anyway.” he said.

When Bryerson finally uploaded a picture he liked (“I’m shirtless jumping my dirtbike over a car.”), he swiped right to on several pictures of girls he knew to show he was interested, but then, “They just kept coming. That’s when it dawned on me: I think I know everyone on Tinder.”

Sources confirmed that Bryerson did in fact know everyone on Tinder, within the app’s maximum set range of a hundred miles. “Actually it doesn’t matter if I set it to one or a hundred miles—it still shows the same profiles.” Including, Breyerson said, a complete catalog of “every girl I dated since I was sixteen. There’s Angela, Pamela, Sandra, and even Rita.” Many show last login as over five years ago. “Probably got boyfriends. Actually, Monica’s married now, Erika doesn’t even live here anymore.”

Bryerson matched with Rita and Tina and sent them both messages that said “Sup,” but neither have messaged back. Tina’s last login was six years ago. “Yeah, that was after we broke up.” Bryerson said. “I just thought I’d check in. I see her at the grocery store every week just about.” Reporters walked down the street to confirm but she wasn’t there by press time. Bryerson received another message from a user named Sandra R., who Bryerson knew personally, but after several days of exchange he discovered it was in fact Sandra R.’s mother that he had been communicating with.

Bryerson was deleting the Tinder app again as the interview was concluding. Reporters also reached out to Tinder for comment but they just sent a laughing-face emoji.

Haines Herring is a column of local news parody.

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