could someone please pass that squishy, blue rubber cube my way?

The most frustrating thing for me is when its very apparent that both myself and the student are frustrated with the way the session is going but I'm the only one trying to curb the problem. I understand that I'm the one with the authority due to my "vast" knowledge on the subject of writing and my little purple name-tag, never the less it really bugs me when the student won't make the same effort to move things along. This doesn't happen frequently (thankfully!) but when it does it almost always involves those non-responsive/ reluctant writers. And its not even with all students of that ilk. Being an introvert to some extent myself I can spot a dozen leagues away the students who demands time to think and a reassuring disposition. However, when the student just sits back and gives me noncommittal response (sometimes even with a smugness that not even their mothers would stand for) I lose my composure a bit and struggle to get it back. Normally this constitutes a pause, a few deep breaths, and more questions to the student about what they feel is important or needs attention in the paper. If this elicits more responses like "I dunno, your the tutor" I give then my observations with the prefix of "you might think about" and send them on there way. Terrible, I know but I think we all can agree that its better then having a scene where I stare for a moment, break a pencil/pen with one hand, and then give the student my real opinion. Its just so frustrating! During one session like this I was trying to clear up the matter of a convoluted sentence and asked the obligatory "What did you mean here? What was it that you meant?" and the student replied "I dunno." You dunno?- of course you know! To some extent you must know you wrote that sentence not me and not someone else because I recognize your word usage! Honestly! Quite a few deep breaths were needed that day but I'm proud to say I wasn't snippy. I was highly professional- although I did feel a tick in the eye start. So my solution is there are no solution because frustration is inevitable and can't be solved necessarily, however since it can be alleviated I still recommend the step-back method and, as Ryan advocates, patience. Although some sort of temperament detector at the door or button to push so the student's chair falls into a bottomless pit wouldn't go astray either.