The station I work at is a CBS affilliate, which is great. I love CBS. Most days. Other days I want to fire them all. This is one of those days. There wasn't a tease for Money Watch. The MedWrap VOs were a repeat of yesterdays. The NewsWrap Top Stories video never showed up. The mine explosion package was 30 minutes late. By the time my anchor got here I was ready to pull my hair out. So, just in case you were wondering, CBS is fired.

And on to today's topic!

Last summer was arguably one of the best summers of my life. I spent a week in Costa Rica, visited the Pike Lakes (which was really just a series of overgrown ponds) often, and was dirt poor. That last part doesn't really fit in with that list, does it? Actually, being poor really enhanced the experience of that summer. You never realize just how good the little things are until you can't afford the big things.

All of my roommate and my money was being sucked into rent, utilities and gas. Then the restaurant she was working at closed so for a month she was unemployed and I was making squat working at the school. That's when we started subsisting on spaghetti and pancakes. Now there's not much you can do to spice up spaghetti, but there's a surprising amount you can do to add some variety to your diet of pancakes. My roommate and I had a box of just-add-water pancakes and a myriad supply of random things in our kitchen cabinets. After about two weeks of eating just plain pancakes, we got pretty creative. You'd be surprised at the things you can add to pancake batter without destroying the pancakes.

1. Hazelnut Coffee Creamer: it works the same way it works in your coffee. it adds just a hint of hazelnut flavoring to your pancakes.

2. Funfetti Sprinkles: you know the funfetti icing? well, eat the icing or frost a cake with that but save the sprinkles. mix them in your batter. voila! funfetticakes.

3. Vanilla Extract: this is more subtle, but it definitely adds variety.

4. Chocolate Chips: this should be a no-brainer, guys.

Now, here's the trick. Cook you up a whole bunch of different varieties. I'm talking way more than you'd eat in a single setting. Then mix them all together in a freezer bag and stick them in your freezer. That way when you go to get breakfast/lunch/dinner, it's like reaching into a prize bag. My roommate and I lived off of these babies for a month.