Publication Name Change & What’s Happening

New Publication Name and Tagline

Hello Subscribers + Readers,

I’ve got a new publication name: “Writing + Art”.

I’m sending this newsletter out to let you know that I have changed the name of my publication. As we all know it was called “Writer’s Notebook” and the logo was a piece of notebook paper.

It was time for a change. After 2 ½ years, the newsletter needed a new name to reflect what it was all about. Writer’s Notebook didn’t really tell anyone that I was also doing art. I wanted that in the name to reflect what I’m mostly doing.

So I changed the name to “Writing + Art”. I reviewed several very creative names. But this one was simple and got to the point. I’m still going to be doing writing but not as much as I was doing. Art has taken over my life, and that’s a good thing. While I love writing, art is the most important thing in my life now. It’s going to be my second career. Balancing a full-time job and my new art job will be difficult but I know I can do it.

The colors of the newsletter will be orange, black, and a turquoise blue. Orange is my favorite color. Black signifies the black outlining in my paintings. The turquoise blue color represents one of my newest favorite colors in my paintings. The paint color is aqua green.

The logo is nothing special. I just liked it and I felt I needed something more professional.

The tagline is “Inspiring Minds”. I hope to continue to inspire people with my writing and art.

For now the art newsletter portion will stay under this publication. Once I launch my business, it might be its own publication. That is still under consideration.

I’m sending this with the notation that it is from me under “Writer’s Notebook” but anything after this newsletter will be coming from “Writing + Art”. You can also see the newsletter graphic and tagline when you visit the front page of the newsletter.

I hope you enjoy the new look and the new art I will be putting out. I’m hard at work on another painting this month.

Hurricane Milton

I had one person reach out to me in a DM to send good thoughts since Hurricane Milton was headed my way. And I had another person send well wishes.

I wanted to send out a little note to bring everyone up to speed on what transpired.

First off, for those that don’t know, I live on the east coast of Florida, Brevard County to be exact. I’m over here where they shoot off the rockets.

We didn’t know what to expect. All of the weather people were telling us that we were going to get the storm as a category 1 as it passed over Tampa and through Orlando on the way to us.

It turned out to not be as bad for us. In my town, we had some branches fall from the trees. There was a lot of rain that fell. The street that I live on got a lot of water. There was no flooding here though. We have several large drains in the street and the water was able to exit the area quickly. We never lost power totally. The power would flick on and off really quickly. It made it hard to watch the television.

The golf course on the other side of my condo was swamped with water near the eighth and ninth holes. There is a pond between both holes and it ran over its edges. The two cart paths for the eighth green and the ninth tee were under water for a few days. The ninth hole has several pom fronds down on the fairway. Those have been there for a few days. It looks like the course is closed for now. On my way to work, I noticed the bike path was under water in one place.

I worked the day that the storm was approaching Tampa. We were getting the wind and rain. We closed early that day and I left with the rain pouring down on me. At first the storm was supposed to linger in our area until mid-afternoon, but then it sped up and was gone mid-morning.

My boss checked on me to make sure I was okay. She had told me before the storm that the plan was to come in the next day at around 11:00 a.m. The higher-ups thought we could come in at 11:00 am and open at 12:00 the next day. My boss and I both thought that was crazy. Then the storm rushed through the state so we did come in the next day at 11:00. I left the day before with the rain pelting me. I got soaked. When I came in the next day, guess what? I was soaked again as I was pelted with more rain as I walked into the building. Two hours later, we opened.

I took a few photos around my condo. After looking at them, I noticed that most were just a few branches down. I decided to show you a photo outside my door. You can see the water that came in from the stairs. Usually when it rains like a hurricane or tropical storm, it will pond in the corridor. You can see that in this case:

Flooding outside my condo door - © Matthew Murray

In Cocoa Beach, which is across the river from me, they had a tornado touch down. A few businesses were destroyed. A few houses also had roof damage, including the mayor.

I heard that about half of the county was out of power. I’m learning today that there is still about 1,700 people without power. They hope to get those people back online in the next few days.

Conclusion

Well, I hope you like the new publication name and graphics. And thankfully we survived the hurricane. There might be another storm on the horizon. I’m hoping that is not true.

Keep those comments coming. It keeps me going and I enjoy hearing from you!

Have questions or want to get in touch with me, hit the button at the bottom and message me.

Until next time, happy reading!

-Matt