diff --git a/src/test/recovery/README b/src/test/recovery/README
index a1e1aa1be1..632e720ebe 100644
--- a/src/test/recovery/README
+++ b/src/test/recovery/README
@@ -9,6 +9,8 @@ Running the tests
 =================
 
 NOTE: You must have given the --enable-tap-tests argument to configure.
+Also, to use "make installcheck", you must have built and installed
+contrib/test_decoding in addition to the core code.
 
 Run
     make check
diff --git a/src/test/recovery/t/013_crash_restart.pl b/src/test/recovery/t/013_crash_restart.pl
index 440ac097fc..c928e9201e 100644
--- a/src/test/recovery/t/013_crash_restart.pl
+++ b/src/test/recovery/t/013_crash_restart.pl
@@ -157,7 +157,6 @@ ok(pump_until($killme, \$killme_stdout, qr/[[:digit:]]+[\r\n]$/m),
 	"acquired pid for SIGKILL");
 $pid = $killme_stdout;
 chomp($pid);
-$pid           = $killme_stdout;
 $killme_stdout = '';
 $killme_stderr = '';
 
@@ -176,7 +175,7 @@ $killme_stderr = '';
 # signal that crash-restart has occurred.  The initial wait for the
 # trivial select is to be sure that psql successfully connected to
 # backend.
-$monitor_stdin = q[
+$monitor_stdin .= q[
 SELECT $$psql-connected$$;
 SELECT pg_sleep(3600);
 ];
@@ -252,6 +251,7 @@ sub pump_until
 	$proc->pump_nb();
 	while (1)
 	{
+		last if $$stream =~ /$untl/;
 		if ($psql_timeout->is_expired)
 		{
 			diag("aborting wait: program timed out");
@@ -269,7 +269,6 @@ sub pump_until
 			return 0;
 		}
 		$proc->pump();
-		last if $$stream =~ /$untl/;
 	}
 	return 1;