Whenever I hear about light I hear about photons but reading about what light is they just say its electromagnetic radiation. If light is just EM radiation then what are photons and how do they relate to this these EM waves?

So..."wavicles" just sounds too silly to you?

Have a look at wave-particle duality (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wave-particle_duality).

i was taught that photons are packets of energy that happen to travel in waves

Photons are 0 mass energy "packets" that are the result of an electron releasing energy by dropping in quantum number from an atom that is emitting that light (or photon). The energy released is at the wavelength of visible light (if you can see it). The photon behaves like a wave in that it has an electromagnetic energy. Scientist have got hung up on the wave or partical thing for years. Really photons are almost more of a blend of each. They behave like both. I hope that helped even though it still is kinda confusing and hard to grasp. Everything in the universe exhibits wave-like and partical-like properties according to the wave-partical duality. Its just a matter of that some things are more partical than wave and some things more wave than partical.

photon energy is measured by rotation, so if a quantum(particle) of right spinning photons is immediately followed by a quantum of left spinning photons then the total stream of photons show alternatively +1 and -1 energy levels, eg a wavelike graph

i was taught that photons are packets of energy that happen to travel in waves

Because they are always leaving or approaching?

(They are very friendly. Wherever there is warmth: there they are!)

So they are particles who are always waving goodbye or hello... Hello Hello

Goodbye Goodbye...I don't know why you say goodbye. I say hello...hello hello