San Diego is the sixth-best large city to live in, according to rankings Monday from financial literacy website WalletHub.

The website ranked the nation’s 62 cities with more than 300,000 people based on their education systems, economy, livability and health. The livability ranking included factors such as ethnic diversity, traffic and affordability, while the health metric took into account air and water quality, crime rates and life expectancy.

San Diego's school system tied for first, along with Austin, Raleigh, Honolulu and Lexington, Kentucky. It was tied for third most diverse city in the country with Anaheim, after Los Angeles and Long Beach.

The top five cities, according to the WalletHub survey, were Austin, Raleigh, Colorado Springs, San Jose and Seattle. San Francisco was the next highest California city, in eighth place. Los Angeles nabbed the No. 51 spot.

Detroit was ranked as the worst city to live in, followed by Memphis, Philadelphia, Cleveland and Indianapolis.

The rankings only applied to actual city boundaries and did not evaluate surrounding metro areas.
 

There is proof women aren't just complaining about freezing office temepratures. According to a study published Monday in the journal Nature Climate Change, air conditioning systems are designed using a 1960s formula that assumed the average office worker was a 40-year-old, 154 pound man.

In addition to making life miserable for women, the cold air could be helping drive climate change, the research team at Maastricht University in the Netherlands said. 

Men, in general, have higher metabolic rates than women, according to the researchers, and they argue that the AC needs to be reset to reflect the true office population. Women prefer rooms at about 77 degrees, while men prefer a cooler 72 degrees, according to Boris Kingma of the Maastricht University Medical Center.

Not many people can say they got secretly married in Disneyland’s Sleeping Beauty Castle.

But for San Diego’s Gabriel and Andrea Estrada, two Disney fans, their dream became a reality.

Following news that an Oakland couple had gotten secretly married at Disneyland, the couple contacted NBC7 to share their story.

Two years ago, Gabriel and Andrea had been saving up for their dream wedding at Disneyland. However, when they began looking for wedding options at the park, the couple said that the cheapest option was $12,000. 

Instead, they decided to spend their savings on a house. 

“We’re going to invest all our money into this house,” said Gabriel, recalling their decision making process. “But what would be the ideal wedding be for us still? And I thought, it was just – Disneyland.”

So Gabriel and Andrea decided to have a secret wedding at Disneyland. 

The couple gathered Gabriel’s oldest daughter, an ordained minister, a witness and packed their bags, heading to Disneyland for what they called a “guerilla-style wedding.”

“We went underneath the castle, we set up a secret camera and we did the whole ceremony,” said Gabriel. “We exchanged rings, we said I do's and the whole process took maybe 10 minutes max.”

The couple said they wanted to be as secretive as possible so as not to get kicked out. They skipped the tuxedo and wedding dress and came dressed in more casual clothes for the event.

“It was a big thrill, you know, to do it secretly,” Gabriel said. “We took a couple pictures afterward and enjoyed the rest of the day at Disneyland.”

Disney representatives did not immediately reply with a comment about the Estrada's story.

The wedding was a dream come true for the Estradas because they are lifelong fans of all things Disney.

In the end, the wedding cost the couple very little, as they were season pass holders.

"We were nervous, we were looking around to make sure we didn't get kicked out or anything," Gabriel said. "But it worked out and it was fun and memorable and not a lot of people can say they got married inside the Disney castle."

A woman claims she found a dead frog in a package of organic baby spinach she bought at a Southern California market over the weekend.

Donna Souza of Covina said she was making herself a salad for dinner when she noticed the frog's legs tucked between the leaves.

The spinach, packaged by Taylor Farms, was purchased at Sam's Club in Glendora, she said. The label on the package says the leaves are "triple washed & ready to enjoy."

A quality assurance director at Taylor Farms sent Souza a letter of apology.

Sam's Club did not immediately return a request for comment. Sam's Club managers told the San Gabriel Valley Tribune that there weren't other reports of frogs appearing in spinach packages.

"I can't eat salad anymore for fear a dead animal will be inside," Souza wrote on Facebook.

The Taylor Farms quality control director explained that a malfunctioning laser scanner may have allowed the frog to pass through its screening process, according to a letter written by Kari Valdés, director of Food Safety and Quality Assurance at Taylor Farms. Souza sent the letter to NBC Los Angeles.

The company is reviewing what went wrong in this instance, Valdés wrote. "I would like to personally extend my deepest apology for any inconvenience this may have caused."

The guide accused of helping an American kill Cecil the lion told NBC News on Tuesday that he felt he did nothing wrong.

Minnesota dentist Walter Palmer allegedly paid Theo Bronkhorst $50,000 to lure the lion out of a wildlife reserve so he could shoot it with a bow.

The animal was a tourist favorite and subject of an Oxford University research project. Its death has provoked global outrage.

"I do not feel I have done anything wrong," Bronkhorst said via telephone. "This has been a very stressful time for me and my family. We have been pulled into something we are not happy with."

Bronkhorst has pleaded not guilty last week to a charge of failing to prevent the unlawful killing of Cecil. He was released on $1,000 bail and was due back in court Wednesday.

Editor's note: Some viewers may find the embedded video of the collision shocking.

A sheriff's deputy was able to pull a driver from a car moments before it was hit by a train in Northern California, officials said.

Commuter train tracks were shut down in both directions in Sunnyvale after two separate trains struck a vehicle at the Mary Avenue crossing, Caltrain tweeted Monday evening.

Video posted on YouTube shows a deputy pulling a driver out of a car stuck on the tracks. The pair is seen running away from the vehicle as a train can be heard fast approaching the area.

The driver then stumbles to the ground and the deputy is seen dragging him out of harm's way moments before the car is hit by a train.

"If it had not been for the deputies being at the right place at the right time, the driver would have been significantly injured," San Mateo County Sheriff's spokesman Salvador Zuno said.

Zuno said deputies Lance Whitted and Erik Rueppel were conducting enforcement in the area when they heard what sounded like a traffic collision. The deputies, who were just a few cars away, saw a vehicle had collided into the crossing guard.

Whitted and Rueppel ran to the collision and found major front-end damage to the vehicle and that a train was approaching the area. Zuno said one of the deputies ran on the tracks to notify the incoming train, while the other deputy removed the driver from the vehicle.

"I believe because of their actions this person is alive today." Zuno said.

The driver appeared to be under the influence, according to Zuno, who said the department was still investigating the incident.

Trains were temporarily forced to share the northbound tracks. Northbound train No. 385 and southbound train No. 274 hit the vehicle, Caltrain tweeted.

A Coronado High School graduate is one of two teens who died at the HARD Summer Music Festival in Pomona Saturday.

Katie Rebecca Dix, 19, of Camarillo, died while attending the annual two-day festival. Tracy Nguyen, 18, of West Covina died in a separate case, according to information released Monday by the Los Angeles County Coroner's Office.

Both women were found unresponsive at the Pomona Fairplex, which is on land mostly owned by the LA County government and managed by the LA County Fair Association.

There are reports that the women died of suspected drug overdoses but the official cause of death in both cases are pending autopsies, the coroner's office said. .

On Sunday, the Twitter account connected to the Coronado High School Associated Student Body (ASB) offered the campus for those wishing to mourn the loss of "our beloved Katie Dix."

Dix was a 2014 graduate of the school, according to the post.

A 19-year-old woman also died last year after attending HARD Summer in Whittier Narrows.

Following the women's deaths, LA County Supervisor Hilda Solis said she plans to ask the county to ban major music festivals on county property in a motion to be introduced at Tuesday's board meeting. 

"I am deeply troubled that this is the third such death to happen in my district in the last year and a half," Solis said. "I will be introducing a motion at tomorrow's board meeting to explore prohibiting these kinds of events on county-owned land until we conduct a full investigation into this issue."

The LA Times reported that Solis and Supervisor Michael Antonovich said they planned to ask for a full investigation to see if the festival was properly managed for the safety of attendees.

Southern California Edison, the company already in hot water over allegations of secret deals that left taxpayers mostly on the hook for the $3 billion shutdown of the San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS) will oversee burying the nuclear waste along the San Diego County coastline for decades to come.

Hearings about the shutdown costs of the nuclear power plant located along Interstate 5 between San Diego and Orange counties drew crowds of angry customers but not much fuss has been made over a plan to bury 3,600,000 pounds of nuclear waste underground along the coast.

The power plant closed in 2012  after a radiation leak led officials to discover damage to hundreds of tubes inside virtually new steam generators.

The controversial shutdown deal left ratepayers stuck with $3.3 billion bill.

Meantime, ratepayer advocates released documents showing the state agency meant to oversee all of this didn’t raise a concern when SoCal Edison told them they were going to start destroying email and “black boxes” from a 2011 energy blackout.

“What most people don’t understand is that when San Onofre went down in January of 2012, that started a chain reaction and we’re now living it,” said attorney Mike Aguirre.

“The people who have all the equipment on that have to go in and clean up the mess, just like with Fukushima, that’s what’s going on at San Onofre.”

SoCal Edison did not return a request for comment Monday and an attorney for the business told NBC 7 in June that the company would not be making any public comments related to a lawsuit brought by clients of Mike Aguirre.

However, the company does explain the dry storage plan for plant waste in a document here.

The company Holtec International was hired to build a dry storage system and has transferred about a third of the spent fuel from SONGS into the containers.

Socal Edison said nuclear power plants throughout the U.S. have been safely storing used nuclear fuel in dry storage canisters since 1986.

A federal investigation after the 2012 leak at San Onofre concluded that a botched computer analysis resulted in generator design flaws that were largely to blame for the unprecedented wear in the tubing that carried radioactive water.

The Chargers have signed a new addition to their defense.

Jordan Mabin, who spent three seasons on practice squads, was signed by the Chargers as a cornerback, according to a statement Tuesday. 

In order for the 5 foot 11 inch, 180 pound player to join the roster, the Chargers released wide receiver Demetrius Wilson, they said. 

Mabin joined the NFL as an undrafted rookie with the Baltimore Ravens in 2012. He played in Baltimore, Cleveland and Atlanta practice squads. 

The Northfield Center, Ohio native played collegiate football at Northwestern. He was an honorable mention for the All-Big Ten pick as a senior in 2011 and was team captain. 

A program launched by a local nonprofit and the San Diego International Airport is helping families of children with autism have smoother travels by rehearsing everything associated with taking off on a trip.

Navigating an airport and catching connecting flights can be stressful for anyone – but the unpredictable crowds, noises and procedures of a busy airport can be especially difficult for people with autism.

Many families that have children with autism cannot travel because the chaotic environment of an airport induces anxiety, behavioral changes and communication breakdowns that often result in stressful travel delays and missed flights.

In an effort to make airports more accessible to individuals with autism, local nonprofit organization Include Autism has teamed up with the San Diego International Airport to offer a program that will help families with autism have an easier time making their way through the airport.

On Tuesday, the organization took a handful of young people with autism from its Community Coaching program to the airport for a travel “rehearsal” of the entire airport process.

The rehearsal aimed to cover all situations one must deal with during a day of travel – from ticketing and going through security, to navigating different gates and actually boarding the plane.

Due to security concerns, the airport doesn’t offer this program on a regular basis. However, Tuesday’s rehearsal offered families of children with autism a much-needed practice run with their loved ones.

Robin Kulek, a local mother whose son has autism, spearheaded the airport project.

"We haven't been able to fly together as a family since Sammy was four because he was not able to manage his behaviors through the airport process," she said.

Now that Sammy is 20 years old, she figured they should try again.

It was at that point that she reached out to Include Autism, an organization Sammy had been involved with for years as a member of their Community Coaching program.

"Practicing the airport process ahead of time will help Sammy know what to expect and ensure everything goes smoothly on our upcoming trip,” Kulek explained.

Not only is the program designed to help individuals with autism navigate an airport environment, but Include Autism’s behavior specialists were also on hand to provide support and teach coping techniques throughout the process to participants.

The program also hopes to give San Diego International Airport staff more insight into the challenges that individuals with autism face and how to better accommodate these families in the future.

Include Autism founder Tina Waters said the organization hopes to work with the San Diego International Airport on an ongoing basis to host these rehearsals for local families.

The organization hopes programs like this will empower individuals with autism to explore their communities and that the community will reciprocate by working to solve common challenges that families with autism face on a day-to-day basis.

Republican billionaire presidential candidate Donald Trump was unfazed when he got a taste of his own medicine Monday, using his leaked cell phone number to promote his Twitter account and campaign website, NBC News reported.

The move comes after Gawker tried to do unto Trump what Trump did to fellow candidate Lindsey Graham. The blog published Trump's phone number on Monday, suggesting readers call him to ask about his "important ideas" a few weeks after Trump gave out Graham's phone number at a campaign rally. 

While Graham destroyed his cell phone in a viral video, Trump embraced the leak. The new voicemail for the business mogul is a campaign message plugging his Twitter and campaign website. 

The U.S. Navy’s Physical Fitness Assessment (PFA) is getting a makeover.

A set of changes to the PFA policy will make it more difficult for sailors to fail the test, but will reduce the amount of chances a sailor has to fail the test before getting booted.

“As opposed to a system that was punitive in nature….this program is designed to talk and incentivise about better health for sailors and not be a test on a pass/fail basis,” said Vice Adm. Bill Moran, Chief of Naval Personnel, in a U.S. Navy video on the subject.

The Navy released an update to its Physical Readiness Program (PRP) on Aug. 3, but several changes will take effect starting on Jan. 1, 2016.

The changes are meant to take a broader, more flexible look at what it means to be healthy and in good physical shape. That meant taking into account the fact that the Navy has more women than ever before and adjusting for different body types and the type of work done on ships and in the Navy, said Moran.

One noticeable change in the new outlines allow for more leeway when it comes to body fat. The body fat percentage standards will now take into account a service member’s age and increase as a sailor gets older.

A Body Composition Assessment (BCA) methodology update means a sailor who is cleared to take part in the physical readiness test (PRT) will take part regardless of their BCA results.

A sailor will have three ways he or she can pass the BCA: by applying a current height/weight table to a sailor, by using a single-site abdominal circumference measurement and by meeting the maximum body fat limit of 26 percent for males or 36 percent for females. Men and women will have stricter standards, outlined here.

The number of failures a sailor can have before they are given administrative separation will decrease starting Jan. 1 from three in four years to two in three years.

“We think that a lot of sailors get lost in the three and four year policy we have today in between tours, because that’s a long period of time,” said Moran.

However, any sailor that has already been given administrative separation, approved or pending, will be given a second chance during the transition period so long as they pass the PFA by Dec. 1, 2015. 

Current PFA rules have maximum body fat percentages and minimum physical readiness scores, but do not look at a sailor’s overall health or take into account how technical jobs with the Navy have become or the sea duty challenges, according to a press release from the Navy.

The PFA has been a past source of controversy.

Navy Secretary Ray Mabus compared it to a twice-a-year crucible in a speech last May at the Naval Academy, according to the Navy Times, where sailors go to extreme measures to pass the test.

In the future, sailors may see a new, Navy-wide healthy eating plan put together by a registered dietitian, an enhanced SHIPSHAPE, better support for post-partum sailors, the potential introduction of a wearable fitness device to keep track of health on a day-by-day or month-by-month basis and re-instating PRT category scoring.

For further details on the changes, click here.

On the day that Sandra Bland’s family filed a federal lawsuit over what officials say was her suicide in a Texas jail, a report released Tuesday shows the number of suicides continuing to rise in local jails.

The report from the Bureau of Justice Statistics, “Mortality in Local Jails and State Prisons, 2000 - 2013,” found that the number of suicides in local jails increased from 300 in 2012 to 327 in 2013.

Suicide was the leading cause of deaths in jails, up 12 percent since 2009 and accounting for 34 percent of deaths in 2013.

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The report also found that overall the number of inmates who died in jails and state prisons rose for the third straight year — 4,446 in 2013, up 131 deaths from the year before. The total was the highest number reported since 2007.

Most jails, 80 percent, reported no deaths in 2013. Nearly a quarter of all deaths among jail inmates, 23 percent, occurred in Texas and California, which had the largest state and federal prison populations.

Paul Wright, the executive director of the Human Rights Defense Center in Lake Worth, Florida, which advocates on criminal justice topics, said there were no surprises in the numbers.

“Barring any change in our sentencing practices, and also in our medical and mental-health care, these numbers are only going to go up,” said Wright, a former prisoner himself.

Approximately 2.2 million people were incarcerated in jails and prisons in the United States in 2013, according to the Bureau of Justice Statistics.

Bland, 28, was found dead in her cell in Waller County on July 13 and officials say she hanged herself with a plastic trash can liner. The Texas Commission on Jail Standards criticized the Waller County Jail for insufficient training.

Bland’s family is suing the state trooper, Brian Encinia, who pulled her over, and others they say are responsible for her death. Encinia has been placed on administrative duties after he was found to have violated procedures regarding traffic stops.

Eric Balaban, senior staff counsel with the ACLU’s National Prison Project, said that to reduce suicides, jails must operate like a large emergency room, with a system to identify prisoners who are at risk, to monitor them and to provide them with adequate care.

“And all of these things must occur very quickly because the risk of suicide is higher at intake and during the first week of incarceration than later in incarceration in a jail setting,” he said.

Ayesha Delany-Brumsey, a senior research associate at the Vera Institute of Justice, said jails can take a number of steps to reduce the number of suicides — from screening prisoners throughout their stay using trained mental-health professionals to forming relationships with community-health providers who might already know the inmates.

“So that if someone’s on medication or someone’s known to be chronically suicidal that that information can get passed on quickly — of course with the person’s consent — but so that the jail staff knows when the person enters that they have someone who they need to pay attention to,” she said.

The number of deaths in jails as a result of drug or alcohol intoxication, accidents and homicides also rose. Homicides and accidental deaths were less common, accounting for 3 percent or less of deaths in jails in 2013, according to the report. Illness-related deaths declined.

The typical jail inmate who died was a white male 35 years old or older and in custody for fewer than seven days.

As far as deaths in state prisons, Texas and California again led with nearly a quarter. Every state department of corrections reported at least one death.

The number of deaths was up 122 from 2012 to 2013. About 90 percent were related to illness, with about half a result of cancer or heart diseases. The number from liver disease, the third leading cause, declined.

Suicides accounted for 6 percent of the deaths; homicides for 3 percent.

Also: the percentage of those who died who were 55 or older has increased by an average of 5 percent a year since 2001 and although the average mortality rate for men and women was nearly equal, the suicide mortality rate among males was 1.5 times the rate for females.

San Diego County health officials confirmed Tuesday that norovirus G1 sickened dozens tied to the same Shelter Island restaurant.

More than five dozen people reported feeling sick after eating at the Bali Hai restaurant on Wednesday, July 29.

Of those, at least three sought care from healthcare providers, and one person was reportedly hospitalized, county officials said Monday.

Sixty-one cases of illness were reported out of 170 people attended a banquet organized by the local chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists. Several employees of NBC 7 attended the dinner.

The Bali Hai, in an abundance of caution, has thoroughly cleaned and sanitized the restaurant. Officials say there should be no concern about eating there.

Bali Hai Restaurant offers Polynesian cuisine and is a popular wedding and banquet venue located on Shelter Island Drive.

Norovirus causes 19 to 21 million illnesses, 56,000 to 71,000 hospitalizations and 570 to 800 deaths annually, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDCP).

Symptoms include diarrhea, abdominal cramps, nausea, vomiting and fever.

The virus can be spread person-to-person, by touching surfaces or objects with norovirus on them or by eating food or drinking liquids that are contaminated with norovirus.

The best ways to avoid it are to wash your hands with soap and water after using the restroom and always before eating or preparing food. Rinse fruits and vegetable carefully before eating them.

A woman found dead inside a home well known to narcotics investigators after a house fire Thursday has been identified by the San Diego County Medical Examiner’s office.

Shelby Ann Black, 25, died at the home on Rancho Encinitas Drive and Camino Ricardo as a result of third and fourth degree thermal burns and inhalation of products on combustion when it caught fire just before 4 a.m.

Officials say they found the body of the woman in a bedroom on the second floor. A mastiff identified as Max was also found dead.

Firefighters say the fire was difficult to attack because the home had many tough-to-reach places.

Several rooms are not up to code and have been modified to hide things, Sheriff's Lt. Mark Moreno said. Crews were able to get a handle on it within 40-50 minutes. The cause of the fire is still under investigation.

During the house fire, officials found one other man who later passed out. Neighbor Derek Gietzen told NBC 7 he watched as a man climbed out of a second-story window as flames roared through both floors. The man was bleeding from cuts and had no shirt or shoes on — just shorts.

"He kind of wandered back a little and sat down, and we're yelling at him to get off the roof, get off the roof," said Gietzen. "And we're saying, 'Is there anyone else inside the house?'"

The man laid down on the edge of the roof and appeared to pass out, so Gietzen and another neighbor stacked a barrel on a table in an effort to reach him — to no avail. They could not get high enough.

"We were standing there panicked because I'm there with my 17-year-old son and thought this guy is going to burn to death in front of us," said Gietzen.

The next set of windows blew out, forcing the onlookers back.

Finally, the 40-year-old man rolled off the roof and landed on the platform the good Samaritans had built. The man had severe burns on his back from the hot roof tiles, according to Gietzen.

He was soon taken to UCSD Medical Center, but not before he revealed there was one other person inside. That person was later identified as Black. 

Lt. Moreno said deputies have been out to the home seven times this year in connection with three drug-related investigations.

Most recently, law enforcement officers served two warrants on July 14 and took the homeowner and a second person into custody.

The homeowner, described as a woman in her 40s, has been arrested several times, officials said. Her cases are either pending or have been adjudicated, according to Lt. Moreno.

On Dec. 23, 2014, multiple agencies converged on the house to serve a search warrant that led to six arrests, including that of the homeowner. All were for outstanding warrants or drug offenses.

If you know anything about the fire or the home, call the sheriff's department at (858) 565-5200.

Where this hoverboard is going, you won't need roads ... just a lot of intense magnets.

Lexus has revealed the inner workings of a hoverboard it teased in June, and while it may not be the "Back to the Future"-style transportation many were hoping for, it is a cool piece of technology, NBC News reports.

The "Slide," as the company calls it, works using an extreme version of the way two magnets repulse one another if they're aligned correctly. Lexus put together a special skate park in Barcelona, Spain, to show off the Slide — but hidden underneath the concrete are a number of pre-laid tracks that the hoverboard will travel along.

A triple homicide in Florida is suspected to be a "Wiccan ritual killing" related to last week's "blue" moon, police said Tuesday, NBC News reported.

Voncile Smith, 77, and her two sons, Richard, 49, and John, 47, were discovered Friday, July 31 during a welfare check, Escambia County Sheriff's Office spokesman Sgt. Andrew Hobbes said.

According to authorities, all three victims had their throats slit and Richard Smith, a Department of Homeland Security employee, was also shot in the head.

The positioning of the victims’ bodies and their injuries led investigators to believe the murders were part of a ritual. A person of interest in the case is also known to practice witchcraft.

A "blue" moon is what it's called when there are two full moons in the same calendar.
 

Israel jailed a suspected Jewish militant without trial on Tuesday, the first application of the controversial measure against a citizen in a government-ordered crackdown following the lethal torching of a Palestinian home, NBC News reported.

The suspect, Mordechai Meyer, a resident of a Jewish settlement in the occupied West Bank, is accused of "involvment in violent activity and recent terrorist attacks as part of a Jewish terror group," Israel's Defense Ministry said in a statement.

Meyers was arrested and placed under so-called "administrative detention" for six months.