Tel Aviv is the Happiest City

The @Israel Twitter account run by the Foreign Ministry welcomed the ranking, tweeting, “Maybe it’s the sun, maybe it’s the people (or maybe it’s the coffee). Who knows? In any case, Tel Aviv was chosen as the happiest city in the World.” high-trafficked roads. As vehicles drive over the crickets’ bodies — which crack easily like potato chips — their guts spill out.

Israel is nabbing quite a few happy records. The country ranked fourth in the 2022 World Happiness Report by the Sustainable Development Solutions Network. Still, it ranked low on some of the factors in the report, including “experiences of calmness” where it ranked second to last.

The more crickets that are run over, the thicker the layers that accumulate on the road, leaving a viscous, clay-colored mixture that can create slick driving conditions, the Nevada Department of Transportation warned on Twitter.

According to TheTravel blog, Tel Aviv is the happiest city in the world.

TheTravel highlighted the city’s “rich cultural heritage, kind people, and abundance of food, shopping, and learning,” noting that Tel Aviv has become “a global hot spot for spring break and vacationing as a whole.”

Tel Aviv was followed by Madrid, Fremont, San Jose, Stockholm, Toronto, Amsterdam, Reykjavík, Bergen and Copenhagen on the list.

In the 2019 World Happiness Report, which focused for the first time on cities, Tel Aviv was ranked the eighth happiest city worldwide. Tel Aviv and Zurich (4th) were the only top 10 cities not located in either the Nordic countries, Australia or New Zealand. Jerusalem was crowned the 33rd happiest city.

Millions of Mormon Crickets

Mormon crickets, which are not actually crickets but shield-backed katydids, are ground-dwelling insects native to the Western United States. They feed on grasses, shrubs and crops, which can contribute to soil erosion and nutrient-depleted soils, according to the University of Nevada, Reno.

The Southwest is experiencing a severe drought, which the university said “encourages Mormon cricket outbreaks” that may last five to 21 years and “cause substantial economic losses to rangeland, cropland and home gardens.”

The name Mormon crickets is derived from how the insects would invade Mormon settlers’ crops in Utah’s Great Salt Lake area around the mid-1800s, according to Washington State University.

The crickets, which are about 2 inches long and have plump bodies, are turning brick homes, front lawns and beige sidewalks a darker shade of russet. They do not bite, but they do induce squeamishness, especially among some newer residents.

“It’s been insane,” said Charles Carmichael, owner Battle Born Pest Control. “It’s been wild. I haven’t sprayed this many houses for crickets in a long, long time.”

Millions of Mormon crickets have arrived in Elko, Nevada, the spindly copper creatures blanketing parts of the city, so staff members at the Shilo Inns Elko on Saturday discussed ways to combat them.

Hotel workers poured a hot water mix of vinegar, bleach and dish soap.

They even aimed pressure washers at the brown clusters of exoskeletons. Still, the jumpy insects kept coming.

Finally, Kimmy Hall, general manager of Shilo Inns, told her overwhelmed staff: “We can’t win against them. But we can hold them off.”

Such has been the mood in Elko, a city of roughly 20,000 residents, as it has been infested with Mormon crickets, which have recently hatched and are in a migratory phase.

Although the crickets have been moving through the area, about 300 miles northeast of Reno, for a few years, millions this month are springing across densely populated neighborhoods and

Killing the crickets can lead to smelly results: The remains stink like fish or dog feces. (© The New York Times)

Starbucks Pays $12M in Race Suit

Shannon Phillips was a regional director in charge of multiple Starbucks branches in Philadelphia. After she was let go in 2018, she filed a lawsuit against the coffee company for firing her, claiming that they had only done so because she’s White.

Starbucks argued against these claims, stating that “senior leaders and members of Partner Resources all observed Ms. Phillips demonstrate a complete absence of leadership.”

Philips’ firing came less than a month after two Black men were arrested in one of the branches she directed. The men were sitting at a table, and because they hadn’t ordered anything, they were asked to leave. When they stayed at the table, explaining that they were waiting for a business acquaintance, the police were called and the two men were promptly arrested for trespassing.

People protested against the arrests, calling for action to be taken against what they perceived to be acts of racial discrimination. In order to do damage control, Starbucks “took steps to punish White employees who had not been involved in the arrests, but who worked in and around the city of Philadelphia,” according to the 2019 suit. Phillips cited an example of such measures, claiming that she was told to suspend a White employee — in one of Starbucks’ attempts to appease the public — and when she came to the worker’s defense, she was fired.

In reaction to the public outcry, the coffeehouse chain made several policy changes, including removing restrictions on staying in the store and using the bathroom without buying anything, and they had about 175,000 employees go through “anti-bias” training, temporarily closing 8,000 of the company’s stores while the training was in progress.

Phillips worked for Starbucks for thirteen years before her termination. She claimed that she wasn’t in the store at the time of the incident and insisted that she “took steps to ensure that the retail locations within her area were a safe and welcoming environment for all customers, regardless of race.” Her lawyer pointed out that “Starbucks chose not to terminate the District Manager of the store where the arrests took place, who was Black, but instead terminated his White supervisor, Ms. Phillips.”

Starbucks claimed that the former regional director “appeared overwhelmed and lacked awareness of how critical the situation had become,” and due to her inability to handle the crisis, a replacement was needed “because strong leadership was essential during that time.”

On Monday, June 12, a New Jersey jury ruled in Phillips’ favor, awarding her $25.6 million in compensatory and punitive damages.