# The parked clarify ride, bounded and re-measured

Date: 2026-08-08, V-663. Same 140 turns, same driver, third and fourth runs of
the day. Before is `d6f3914`, after is that plus two changes.

## What was measured before

One question about a reminder's day rode turns 6 to 13. It ended only because
turn 14 was a new request. Two of those turns are the worst replies in the
corpus:

```text
спасибо   -> Сейчас 21:25. В какой день?
привет    -> Сейчас 21:25. В какой день?
```

V-654 had already added `MaxSuspends` and the tail count had not moved.

## Why three bounds let it happen

The TTL, `MaxAttempts` and `MaxSuspends` all exist and all were rearmed.

An aside spends no attempt, so `MaxAttempts` never reaches it. A turn reading as
a failed answer zeroes `Suspends`, so `MaxSuspends` never reaches the asides.
`спасибо` read as a failed answer. So the pleasantry both produced the reply
above and paid for it out of the budget meant to end the ride.

## The two changes

`PendingQuestion.Rides` counts the same event as `Suspends` with the resets
taken out. Set once, incremented only in `noteSuspended`, carried across the
re-park in `askRemainingGap`. `MaxRides` is 4, one looser than `MaxSuspends` so
that the tighter statement about a run stays reachable.

A pleasantry is an aside, not a failed answer. The set is a new closed lexicon
entry, matched as whole utterances rather than tokens. `вечер` answers `это утра
или вечера?` and `нет` answers a confirm. Anything that could fill a slot stays
out.

## Result

| | before | after |
|---|---|---|
| turns carrying a clarify tail | 21 | 17 |
| turns carrying any failure string | 31 | 29 |
| the longest ride | 8 turns | 4 turns |

The turns carrying a tail, by number:

```text
before  6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13   53 54 55 56 57   99 102 103   116   136 137 138 139
after   6 7 8 9                53 54 55 56 57   99 100 101   116   136 137 138 139
```

Turn 10 is the change. It now reads:

```text
спасибо -> Прошлую просьбу отпускаю. Пожалуйста, я всегда готова помочь тебе.
```

She lets the request go, says so, and answers the man. Turns 11 to 13 are clean.

**`MaxRides` is not what fired.** The pleasantry is an aside now, so it no
longer breaks the run. `MaxSuspends` reached three on turn 10 and ended it.
`Rides` is the backstop for the shape where an answer really does break the run.
No turn in this corpus reaches it.

## What did not move

Four rides are untouched. Turns 53 to 57 are five consecutive asides against a
reminder missing its day. Turn 58 is a new request that drops it. Nothing
pleasant appears in that run, so neither change applies. Turns 99 to 101 shifted
by one, and 116 and 136 to 139 are unchanged.

So the fix is worth four turns of twenty-one. What is left is asides against a
question the owner never answers. `MaxSuspends` was written for that shape and
does bound it, at four turns each.

## Not attributable

Latency moved p50 1.1s to 1.5s and p95 2.8s to 3.0s, and the 34.3s outlier in
the earlier run is gone. Both runs had the workstation up. Read none of it as
caused by this change.

One unrelated defect appeared in the after run and is recorded here because it
is visible in the transcript. Turn 4 answered `Я записала твою привычкуRegarding
coffee without sugar.` That is English leaking into a Russian reply with no
space in front of it. It is a phrasing defect and it has no task yet.