Adventure! Wild Animals You Can Eat (and some you might not want to)

I've got to admit, this living near the beach thing does not suck. When we moved here, Mrs. Packman and I were not so sure what to think about leaving the comfort of The City. But now I know - there's just so many fun things to do here!

FBS chooses his friends very well, and one of them has a father who owns a 30-foot cabin cruiser power boat. FBS had never been out on a boat before, and as a worldly boy of three-years-old, we knew that this could not stand for long. Thus, an invitation was procured, and a life vest purchased, and off we went.

Are there any pirates out there, dad?

He actually seemed to really enjoy it, especially when we opened up the throttle and went very fast, or we hit the wakes of other boats and bumped up and down on the water. FBS was amazingly well behaved through the whole trip, and I got to take some pictures of our town from the water.

It was a perfect summer day

FBS really liked it when the draw bridge went up!

After our adventure on the water, it only seemed natural to try and catch some of the tasty creatures who live in the water. FBS and I have been fishing for short periods most weekends of this summer, but we have yet to catch anything together. I was beginning to lose hope that we would catch something at all before his three-year old patience was just about used up. However, this was our lucky day!

The moment we threw some bait into the water with his Spider-man fishing rod, there was a fish on the line!

It's a porgy!

What was FBS' immediate reaction to seeing the fish? "I want to eat it!" It made me proud.

Even Mrs. Packman got in on the action!

Look Packman, I caught one too!

Needless to say, both the porgy and the snapper made their way onto the grill that evening.

Fresh fish - YUM!

We also managed to spend some time exploring the local wildlife in our backyard. Specifically, the slimy kind of wildlife. Mini-man discovered this slug of some sort, and found it quite interesting.

What's that?

I, of course, being the curious sort, had to investigate the creature a bit more closely.

I'll call him Slugo

We see these things in our yard all the time. Perhaps they have something to do with the lack of tomatoes on my plants this summer?

After all of this fun and adventure, it was time for some relaxation, so we hit the beach. There have been hurricanes and tropical storms kicking up the surf the past few weeks, but finally the ocean was calm enough for me and the kids to splash around in the water, which is actually a pretty good workout. FBS likes me to lift him over the incoming waves, which basically involves me curling his weight over and over again as he squeals with glee. Tiring, but worth it.

Of course, one more picture of mini-man enjoying the sand:

Life is good. Enjoy the autumn.

What a weekend!

This was a great weekend.

It's been a very busy summer for the Packman family. We've either had guests stay with us (we do live by the beach!) or we've been away just about every weekend since memorial day, and to be honest we were all getting a little tired of it. Finally, we had a weekend to ourselves, with no plans or responsibilities.

Saturday morning dawned with a cloudless sky, and I headed off to drill with the rescue squad. This is my normal Saturday morning plan, and I usually spend from 8-11:30 or so drilling on water rescue or EMS skills and maintaining the equipment. This Saturday, there was a memorial swim for a fallen firefighter taking place off of Far Rockaway, so we took our new rescue boat out to pay our respects and keep an eye on the swimmers. It was great to be out on the water!

When I returned home, it was time to do one of FBS' favorite activities: go to Costco! It is a bit embarrassing how much he loves going to warehouse stores, mostly because there are very nice people who will let him sample all kinds of glorious junk food as we walk around the store. Funny kid, but I must admit that the chicken ravioli in pesto sauce they were handing out were quite tasty.

The shopping done, it was time for some adventure, and this was one I had been looking forward to for a very long time. When I was a kid, I really enjoyed going fishing. At summer camp I was always looking for an excuse to go to a stream or lake with a rod and reel, or even a handline. My grandfather at one point managed a fleet or swordfishing boats out of Cape Cod, and when I visited him as a teen he would often charter a boat for the day and we would go after blues and stripers. I spent many hours looking through fishing catalogues and organizing my tackle box, dreaming about the fish I would catch on my next trip out of New York City. You could say that I was an enthusiastic, if quite unsuccessful fisherman.

It was time to take FBS fishing for the first time.

I had been accumulating gear on his behalf for some time. He had a spider-man fishing rod, which I had taught him to cast in the backyard. He had a lifejacket to wear in the unlikely event he fell off the dock into the water. He had the fickle enthusiasm of a three year old ready to try something new.

My plan was to keep it to a short trip down to a dock to cast for fluke. I wanted to keep it short so that FBS would not get bored. I didn't really expect to catch anything, but I didn't really care either. I just wanted it to be fun. If we caught anything, it would be gravy.

It was fun!

FBS and I spent over an hour on the dock, which for a three year old is a long time to do anything without getting bored. We fished with his rod, we lay on our bellies and watched small baitfish swimming around, and we were not skunked - I caught many small see-through jelly fish with my hands and let FBS play with their slimyness, which he really liked. (These were non-stinging jellyfish, or I would not have been catching then or handing them to my kid!)

FBS had such a great time that he refused to take a nap. He actually said to me, "no daddy, I don't want to take a nap. I don't want to miss all the fun!" How cool is that?

The evening was a bit difficult, as the kids were overtired, but it was an OK tradeoff in my book.

Saturday night brought another adventure our way: Mrs. Packman and I hired a babysitter and went out to a dinner of Thai food in NYC, followed by a party at the home of some good friends. It's good to have an "adult" evening every once in a while, no matter how much fun you have with the kids.

Sunday morning started much earlier than I would have liked, considering my 2am bedtime after the party. At about 6:30 my rescue squad pager went off with a report of a pedestrian struck by a motor vehicle. It was my first major trauma call with the squad, and I handled myself well and learned a huge amount as we got the poor guy to a trauma center in Queens ASAP. We really made a difference in this guy's outcome, and I felt really good about being able to help.

The rest of the day was spent on some of our favorite activities. We spent the morning at the beach:

Playing at the beach

Staying hydrated at the beach is important

We grilled hotdogs for lunch, and then FBS asked to go fishing again! Of course, I took him :)

In the evening after a delicious dinner of tacos, we headed out for our traditional pajama walk along the boardwalk near our home.

Evening pajama walk

My beautiful wife

All in all, this was a great weekend. We really need to spend more time just enjoying ourselves, rather than over planning every summer weekend ahead of time.

Stay tuned for more adventure to come, including The Great American Road Trip!

Feed Me! (Fresh, Healthy Food!)

So a few years back I read the book Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan. It really struck a chord with me, and I decided to try and take more responsibility for the food that I feed my family.


Living in Brooklyn at the time, this was not an easy thing to do. We considered joining a CSA, but most of the folks we knew who did so were overrun with esoteric veggies they had no idea how to cook (kohlrabi, anyone?). While not a bad thing, per se, with an infant around it did not seem like a good idea for us. I also had friends who were raising laying hens in the backyard of their brownstone in Park Slope, but Mrs. Packman nixed that idea pretty quick - she liked having what little backyard she had free of chicken poop.


Now that we have moved out of the city, however, my options have grown. First things first, I now have room to try my hand at some gardening. I have learned that there is much more to it than just putting some plants in the ground and picking veggies!


I found some plans online to build a "salad table" for growing salad greens. It turned out pretty well:



From left to right there is spinach, romaine lettuce, and red cabbage. This was fun, but it provided us with salad for all of one week. Obviously I'll have to do better next time around. I also planted tomatoes, which I've had great luck with in the past in pots, but we've had no sun this year and lots of rain, so while the plants are growing well, not so much fruit.


As for protein, since I live on the water, fish seemed like the obvious answer. I loved fishing as a kid, and I've discovered that I still love it, though I have a great deal to learn!



That's a fluke, which is what they call summer flounder here on Long Island. Sadly, it's not a keeper. They have to be 21.5 inches long to keep(!) so this guy got thrown back. I was pretty happy to have caught anything, however. My goal for the summer is to pull at least one keeper striped bass out of the local waters. I may have missed my chance last weekend when I saw birds dive bombing the shore, but I didn't have my gear with me. Two guys each got a fish within a few minutes of starting to cast!


I also cooked up a pheasant last weekend that was shot by a colleague of mine. All I can say is, WOW. It was described by a friend who is somewhat of a gourmand as an "uber chicken." I just called it good eating. I'm going to have to give this hunting thing some serious consideration this fall. Being able to eat venison, ducks, pheasants, and goose all year that I shot myself seems like a very cool idea.


I'm open to any ideas for taking more responsibility for my food that any of you may have. Please take a moment to share!