Always remember that these guys (ATC) work for you. If you need to verify landing clearance on short final and it's really busy and they yell at you, well that's just tough. If you are not sure of the taxi route and need to stop or ask them for help and they yell at you, that's just tough. Their bad day will never cause me to have a bad day and they can do all the yelling in the world when I'm doing something for the safety of my flight. It's rare for these guys to get heated, but some of them work in very fast settings and according to ones I've interviewed, they sometimes don't realize how "fast" they are trying to push everything around, including their own words. So it's perfectly within the scope of reality that they may ask you to do something that you are unable to do.
A good test for this is always safety of flight. If you are doing something for convenience, such as rolling out to the end to take the taxiway that is closest to where you want to go, that is not for the safety of flight. If they are asking me to turn left at taxiway X and I've just landed...well, that's nice that they have offered an option that I may or may not take depending on my speed and when I feel it's safe to turn off.
This usually doesn't cause any real issues. Most controllers are well aware of the issues above and their own limitations. They usually completely understand when someone doesn't comply with an unrealistic instruction. Many times, feedback is important. Call up the tower after the flight and ask to speak to the manager. These aren't big bad scary people that will bite your head off. If there are repeat problems, ASAP and use the union and other contacts to try and make changes.
Still, remember that they are always working for you. Sometimes we get led down the road of complying with something that wasn't a great idea in the first place. There may be an illusion that you are working for them, when they ask you to do stuff, but you are flying the plane.
