diff --git a/stacks/waterland-studio/README.md b/stacks/waterland-studio/README.md
index 2b9bfac..03a79ad 100644
--- a/stacks/waterland-studio/README.md
+++ b/stacks/waterland-studio/README.md
@@ -161,3 +161,10 @@ Verified here after the update: `/api/jobs` went **1 → 16** against 16
 directories on disk, with nothing reclaimed — correct, since 16 is under
 `RETAIN=40`; adoption only made them visible. The bound now holds across
 restarts, so no hand-pruning is needed.
+
+**Don't chase the one `failed` job in that list.** Adoption marks a job
+`failed` on exactly two conditions: a sidecar saying `running`/`queued`, or a
+directory with no `plate.png`. The renders that died 1.7 s in on the missing
+CUDA headers (before that fix) wrote a source and never a plate, so they land
+in the second branch. It is adopted history being labelled honestly, not a
+current fault.