Sand

You are going to watch this video of Sand Flea, a robot developed by Boston Dynamics, and for a few seconds you are going to be bored. After all, Sand Flea isn't much to look at - just an 11 pound robot with large plastic wheels that don't look hi-tech or expensive, and all the robot does at first is move noisily over what appears to be a parking lot - much like a remote-control car. But then Sand Flea comes to a wall, and instead of...

PHOENIX -- Jerry Sands was optioned to minor-league camp Tuesday morning, taking him out of contention to win a bench spot on the opening-day roster. Sands, 24, entered spring training as the favorite to claim the one available reserve role. A former organizational minor league player of the year, Sands hit .253 with four home runs and 26 runs batted in in 61 games last season. He was particularly effective in September, hitting .342 in 20 games. His September form raised hopes that he could replace Andre Ethier in the outfield or James Loney at first base on days the Dodgers faced a left-handed pitcher.

Forgetting that he simply needs to play every day to continue his development, there's another reason why the Dodgers should not start the season with Jerry Sands on their roster. He's just not ready. Most had Sands penciled in as a reserve outfielder this season with the Dodgers in serious need of a power bat off the bench. Only he's not hitting this spring and looks uncertain at the plate. Maybe they've messed with his swing one time too many. He went 0-for-2 Wednesday in the Dodgers' 3-0 loss to the Padres, and is now hitting .154 for the spring.

It is still pretty early, of course, the Dodgers yet to arrive to the midpoint of their spring training season. Still, you have to wonder if that pencil that wrote Jerry Sands onto the Dodgers' opening-day roster best have had the lightest of leads. Sands went hitless in two at-bats in the Dodgers' 5-2 loss to the Rockies at Camelback Ranch on Tuesday, and is now 2-for-14 (.143) this spring. Not exactly alarming in mid-March, but with Manager Don Mattingly saying Sunday he would not start the season platooning Andre Ethier and James Loney, you have to wonder if Sands is going to get at-bats that the young hitter still needs.

This is for those who don't mind traveling to Earth's edge to get somewhere extraordinary. Broome is in the Kimberley, a hunk of Western Australia the size of California but whose population is only 41,000 hide-skinned, Akubra-sporting (you know, the iconic hat) individuals. It also has some of the country's whitest sand, warmest waters, reddest cliffs and most outlandish geological formations. And those hide-skinned people are almost bizarrely kind. Without fail, if you pull over to look at a map, take a photo or argue with your navigator, they stop their car to ask, "Youse alroight?"

Reporting from Phoenix — Jerry Sands was awakened at 4:30 a.m. on Thursday by a phone call. The automated call was from the Johnston County School District in North Carolina, where the second-year outfielder worked as a substitute teacher in the off-season. He was informed there was a shift available. "I have to call them and tell them I'm not in town," Sands said. "I have to get it out of the way so they quit calling me. There's a couple hours difference. " Until about two weeks ago, as he had in previous winters, Sands taught English and math a couple of times a week in the district's middle and high schools.

The prime minister is talking about being "held hostage" by U.S. interests. Radio ads blare, "Stand up to this foreign bully. " A Twitter account tells of a "secret plan to target Canada: exposed!" Could this be Canada? The cheerful northern neighbor: supplier of troops to unpleasant U.S.-led foreign conflicts, reliable trade partner, ally in holding terrorism back from North America's shores, not to mention the No. 1 supplier of America's oil? Canada's recent push for the proposed Northern Gateway pipeline to carry oil from the tar sands of Alberta to the nation's West Coast, where it would be sent to China, has been marked by uncharacteristic defiance.

L.A. County supervisors learned Tuesday what happens when you try to fix a problem that doesn't really exist. It all began last week when the supervisors approved what they thought was a routine updating of various county beach codes, including a four-decade-old ban on playing football and Frisbee on public sand. But that section of the law was obscure. Beach officials had not issued a single citation in at least 40 years. The update, part of an effort by county lawyers to clean up and modernize volumes of laws, called for loosening the ban on ball play during the fall, winter and spring months when fewer crowds are at the beach.

Just off a rutted dirt road, a beach as white as flour pops into view from behind a wall of sea grape and rustling palms. Pelicans slice over turquoise waters, and not a single person stirs the quiet. The tableau, along a little-developed segment of Mexico's Caribbean coast, is a beachgoer's fantasy of unspoiled seaside splendor. Until you look down. For as far as the eye can see, the sand glitters with bits of bright color: fragments of trash, thousands and thousands of them, strung like a vast, foul necklace.

Hugging the sand south of Hermosa Beach Pier, this three-story contemporary evokes a glass-clad lifeguard tower angled toward the water. The main living areas, the master bedroom and the office with balcony take in the ocean views. The dining room opens to a patio along the bike path and the beach. The details Location: 718 The Strand, Hermosa Beach 90254 Asking price: $6.5 million Architect: Dean Nota Year built: 1999 House size: Three bedrooms, four bathrooms, 3,100 square feet Lot size: 2,397 square feet Features: Granite kitchen counter, stainless appliances, master bathroom with double showers, a steam room and a tub About the area: Last year, 98 single-family homes sold in the 90254 ZIP Code at a median price of $1,100,000, according to DataQuick.