BLESSED RELIEF came as I prepared to take a week offline to get my head back But coming on the back of two short weeks, it was a headache to get everything done that I could—so that week is this week, if you follow. Still, I managed to finish a short novel: based on John Lanchester’s recent praise of the entirety of Georges Simenon’s Maigret series, I started at the beginning to see what he enjoys so much. More to come.

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My stories this week: Magazine stories that will appear in the next couple of months, so just a couple of shorts really: O’Neill on the “invisible god” hacker and Charlotte Jee on the reasons that digital contact tracing apps in Australia and France have produced so few notifications.

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Things my friends have made: Alok Jha on pandemic prevention • Annalee Newitz takes to the pages of the Chronicle to look at the future of Muni.

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Notebook: Lockwood on lockdown is worth reveling in • I hadn’t heard of Atari Democrats before • And I hope I never hear about Quibi ever again. • Enjoyed The Loss of Public Goods to Big Tech • Not a fan of virtual reality? Imagine if you had to wear this get-up • Lovely football lingo from around the world.