STREET WISE: / New Directions : A Street That Gets Down to Business

My favorite street in North County (exclusive of the street wherein my mortgage resides) is Hill Street in Oceanside.

More precisely, the 2 1/2 miles of Hill Street from the Carlsbad line to Mission Avenue, palm-tree lined, a block parallel to the beach, a street that works, that buys and sells.

Part of this is nostalgia. When my trade brought me to San Diego County a dozen years ago, my then-employer posted me to a no-windows, cinder-block building on Hill Street. I survived thanks to a down-home diner (Randy’s) and a very good magazine store (Coronet News Stand).

This is no effete street, no paper-pushing street (no attorneys whatsoever), no tourist street.

But neither does Hill Street have the vulgarity of oversized signs and overhead utility lines that one associates with so many commercial strips (are you listening, Vista?). Being in business is not the same as having a libido for the ugly.

Hill Street is devoted to All-American pursuits: eating (many restaurants, none that require a tie), sleeping (motels and the Dolphin Hotel) and driving (car dealers, car parts, car washes, gas stations).

There are no silly stores with names like Speckled Frog or Frumious Bandersnatch that give you no idea what’s being sold inside. About the only store putting on airs is the Bedding Liquidators store, but even that is balanced by its rival, Geb’s Furniture.

A boutique wouldn’t last a month on Hill Street. Don’t ask me how the Pacific Gourmet Bakery ever got approved; probably a slip in the zoning process.

Gold’s Gym and a karate studio, that’s Hill Street. Also, the military recruiter and more furniture stores than you can imagine.

When I was assigned to that cinder-block building, I would often lunch at Anita’s No. 2 (a Mexican restaurant). From my favorite table, I could watch the businessmen come and go from the massage parlor across the street.

You can bowl, die (the Oceanside cemetery), get a bargain (a 99-cent store) and go to the Moose Lodge on Hill Street. What else is there to life? If you want to live in a mobile home park, you can live on Hill Street, too.

I still return (mostly on Sunday nights, accompanied by spouse and two children who seem to follow us everywhere) to Angelo’s Burgers at the southern end of Hill Street: across the street from a Planned Parenthood outlet and the Tackle Box bait store.

Angelo’s offers us, according to the marquee, “The World’s Best Onion Rings & Zuccini.” People come to Angelo’s for fast food and large servings, not spelling.

Angelo’s even has two drive-in lanes. One for cars with two or more people. Imagine that: a commuter lane for a burger stand.

Recently my son, Wesley, who is 5, and I have been traveling Hill Street with some regularity on our way to and from the Oceanside beach and pier on weekend mornings.

He’s interested in stopping some day at Reptiles Plus. I say OK, but only if we can visit the House of Harleys motorcycle store as well.