Angry?

This weekend brought up an interesting situation.  After dealing with my twin 6 year olds and their weekly room cleaning, it was time for me to sit down and read some discussion posts in my classes.  Sounds harmless right?  Well, maybe you haven't had the experience of trying to get twin girls to pick up their toys, hair things, clothes, etc. and put them away.  (No, "away" does not mean put your clean clothes, hair ribbons and toys in the clothes hamper because it's the closest place to hide them!)

So, I finally got the room sorted out and was ready to read all of my students' insights.  However, after the third post of reading misspellings, bad grammar and strange comments, I couldn't take it.  Trust me when I say three posts shouldn't get me this upset.  I'm not even grading this discussion on grammar and spelling.  That's when it dawned on me, I was still angry from cleaning the room.  So, I walked away from the computer and did something else for awhile.

When I came back, the posts I came back to weren't as bad as I thought and was able to give some feedback and guidance which moved the conversation forward.  The experience was much nicer and I'm sure my responses to the students were much better received.

How do you know when it's not a good time to check your classes?  Do you have a fall-back time to do your classwork so you aren't forced to do it angry?