August 8, 2009:
Mixed buildings alongside the main streets.
Small businesses, two-story apartments, single story houses with fences. Vacuum repair, shoe store, taqueria, apartments, dry cleaner. Away from the artery the neighborhood becomes more consistently houses. Two or three blocks and the houses become more expensive.
El Camino Real, on the San Francisco Peninsula. My childhood home of University Avenue, La Mesa, a satellite of San Diego.
Look down, the sidewalks are cracked and mottled with hard black chewing gum.