Theo Lorenz (theonicole)
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theotrix.bsky.social
Theo Lorenz (theonicole)
@theotrix.bsky.social
940 followers 250 following 1.3K posts
Cat wrangler, creative gremlin, professional house snooper, tired. They/he 🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍⚧️
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theotrix.bsky.social
Ain’t she just?
The reference photo for the digital painting at top of thread. Aside from the medium, the main differences are a cardboard box in the background and some litter from this perfect little princess’s paws on the floor.
October 27, 2025 at 1:13 AM
theotrix.bsky.social
Zelda 💛🧡🤍

(This is probably the best digital painting I’ve ever done)
A digital painting of my little calico cat Zelda crouched on the porch floor with a sunbeam at her back. The floorboards beneath her are painted the warm shades of the rainbow in a yellow to orange gradient, and the magenta wall behind her is mostly in shadow. Her face is in shadow, but the sun catches her whiskers, and color from the painted floor reflects in her eyes and illuminates the soft edges of her face. This painting took at least 20 hours across a few weeks.
October 27, 2025 at 12:58 AM
theotrix.bsky.social
Eggs are so much fun to paint! There’s no true white in egg whites—they’re translucent, shiny, and bubbly, so they collect all the colors around them 🥚🌈
A digital painting of two sunny side up eggs cooking in a frying pan. Their edges are just starting to brown in the butter that bubbles around them, but the whites are still a little bit liquidy right around the yolks—almost ready. Two different friends I showed this to said it made them hungry, so I think it was successful! This took 8 to 10 hours to paint.
October 27, 2025 at 12:47 AM
theotrix.bsky.social
Digital painting of my bedroom window at 5am. I’m calling this one “Shit, not again.”
A digital painting of my bedroom window during sunrise. Tree branches hang outside, where sunlight peeks between the top of the neighbor’s roof and the bottom edge of my own roof. Inside, the bedroom is dark except for that peek of sunlight, which makes a stripe of peachy pink and yellow through the thin, pulled back curtains. An air conditioner in the left window hums away, its temperature display glowing “75” in the dark, and old t-shirt stuffed into the gap between window panes to keep the cold from escaping. This painting took around 15 hours.
October 27, 2025 at 12:30 AM
theotrix.bsky.social
Digital painting used to intimidate me, but recently something clicked. I’ve been working through photos in my art refs folder that have tricky elements like glowing, low light, and clouds, and practicing.
A digital painting of my hand holding up a translucent yellow coaster. It’s lit from behind, and the coaster is catching the sun and glowing with warm colors while the rest of the image is mostly shadowed. This was my first try at glowy lighting in a digital painting, and it took a few hours across multiple sittings. A digital painting of a golden pillar candle burning in the dark. This took an hour or two. A digital landscape painting of a Menards parking lot at twilight. Most of the painting is a sky with stripes of fluffy clouds, and the very bottom is taken up by the low, shadowed shapes of commercial buildings, parking lot lamp posts, and utility poles with wires strung between them. This one took about 8 hours. A quick, sketchy digital painting of my fluffy cat Toby poking his nose over a pile of blankets, ears perked up light he’s just been offered snacks. The lighting is soft sunlight that makes the edges of objects look fuzzy
October 27, 2025 at 12:14 AM
theotrix.bsky.social
Toby has invented a game called Yurt Thrash, where he stuffs his front half into a cat tent that’s way too small for him and thrashes around like he’s killing it from within. Yurt Thrash is his favorite game and only accepted mode of exercise.
A very large fluffy cat named October Von Spoopypants lying on the floor with his head and front legs inside a half collapsed rainbow cat tent. He’s peering out one of the tent windows, in between thrashings, his pupils wide.
October 16, 2025 at 2:22 AM
theotrix.bsky.social
A year in, our front porch rainbow is holding up surprisingly well considering I never got around to sealing it. Still really proud of this!
The rainbow on my porch floor, freshly cleaned, with Chad the cat loping across it. Colors are still bright! View of the same rainbow floor facing the front porch door. It has a few nicks and scuffs but is overall shockingly close to the condition it was in when first painted
October 7, 2025 at 12:50 AM
theotrix.bsky.social
What fresh fuckery is this
A screenshot of the ADA website, with a banner at the top that reads “Democrats have shut down the government. Department of Justice websites are not currently regularly updated.”
October 3, 2025 at 12:35 AM
theotrix.bsky.social
Not quite! It's on the side of the pool, and I'm pretty sure it's only directly over the grand entrance and sunken family room, not the main gallery area. Deeply weird, but less precarious than it sounds
A screenshot from the video linked at the end of this thread, showing the swimming pool window. It's on the side of the pool and tucked inside at least 2 feet of material that supports the pool
September 27, 2025 at 8:29 PM
theotrix.bsky.social
The part that really gets me is the pool. The second floor has a suspended lap pool. A SUSPENDED LAP POOL. ON THE SECOND FLOOR.
The sunken living room off the back entrance. It's filled with light and unusual shapes, and an odd, bowed shape hangs over it. That's the bottom of the lap pool. No, really. The second floor lap pool, which is suspended directly over that sunken living room. In this photo from an old listing, it's empty, and the window below the water level is visible. Someone has set up cheerful beach chairs and an umbrella on the bottom of the pool. Above it, a peaked roof made entirely of windows pours light in. Next to the pool, a very 1980s hot tub setup featuring pink tiled stairs, a mirrored surround, and a wood paneled ceiling. Stunning. The pool with water in it, ready to meet your perfectly reasonable lap-swimming needs.
September 27, 2025 at 7:49 PM
theotrix.bsky.social
It has beautifully maintained 1920s living spaces...and also a postmodern gallery space in the back. And a suspended walkway with an elevator. And a sauna on a stair landing?
A classic living room with those tall arched windows, a marble fireplace, coved ceilings, and archways. The grand rear entrance, which has multiple different levels of wood slatted ceilings, marble floors, random columns, and steps leading into a sunken living room. A curving, meandering walkway with brass railings that's suspended by columns on the second floor. It leads to an elevator. Also somewhere near that walkway is this sauna, which is tucked into a curved column and steps out onto a carpeted landing.
September 27, 2025 at 7:41 PM
theotrix.bsky.social
I can't stop thinking about this mansion on Lake Harriet that belonged to a modern art collector. This is the front and back of THE SAME BUILDING.
The front facade of a classic Spanish Revival mansion, which features tall arched windows placed with careful symmetry, balconies with black metal railings, and a terracotta tile roof. The completely bonkers back of said mansion, which is a glorious explosion of 1980s postmodern architecture. It features a dramatic zigzag of triangular columns of windows jutting out the back, a rounded corner with stripes, an enormous angled skylight up top, more balconies, and a side entrance made up of strange shapes that sort of looks like a goose head.
September 27, 2025 at 7:32 PM
theotrix.bsky.social
It’s so warm in my office, and yet…
The view over my shoulder as I’m working from a comfy chair: a small calico cat named Zelda is curled up in a tangle of limbs behind my left shoulder, her back foot and forehead against the back of my neck. She’s purring and gazing at the camera. Why is she so cute when it’s so warm?
August 19, 2025 at 10:18 PM
theotrix.bsky.social
Any Minneapolis folks looking for a large home or mixed-use/office space? My latest listing is a home I've literally dreamt about--HUGE 6 bed/3 bath/2 car home with flexible zoning, just off Lake Street.

matrix.commondataplatform.com/matrix/share...
An exterior shot of 3011 17th Ave S, a large 2-story stucco house with a navy blue fence. Its neighbors to the sides are another house and a block of Lake Street businesses. A shot of the expansive living and dining rooms, which include a brick fireplace, original woodwork, built-in bookshelves and pillars, and a built-in buffet in the dining room. There isn't any real estate photography trickery here--the living room alone is 20 feet by 14 feet. The bright and sunny kitchen, which was fully renovated in 2018 for the family that lived here. It has light gray cabinets, white quartz countertops, stainless steel appliances, and heated tile floors. Not pictured is the adjacent walk-in pantry. This kitchen taunts me in my dreams. It's such a great space for cooking together!! One of three spacious bedrooms upstairs, all of which have walk-in closets, great natural light, and hardwood floors. There are two more bedrooms on the main floor and one bedroom in the basement with a massive closet that used to be the original coal chute.
August 19, 2025 at 8:02 PM
theotrix.bsky.social
I cannot with this creature and her complete disregard for physics
A small dilute calico cat named Zelda folded up in incomprehensible ways between my side and the arm of the chair I’m in. Her knee is pressed against her cheek and folded over her front leg, her other back leg appears to be sticking out backwards underneath her, and her face is smooshed against my side so hard that her eyes are mostly shut. She looks like a badly drawn picture of a cat. She is purring. Moments later, Zelda had rolled herself into an upside down pillbug pose and is staring wide-eyed up at the camera with all four limbs in the air and her tail curled up her belly. She is perfectly content and purring.
July 26, 2025 at 9:02 PM
theotrix.bsky.social
We had my dad’s much-belated memorial service today, and I got a room full of people to repeat in unison the comforting affirmations my dad told us every night as kids. I didn’t really understand how lucky we were to grow up with “Those Things” until now.
A page from my dad’s memorial program, featuring an old photo of Dad with my grandma and uncle. It reads: Those Things A simple reminder to loved ones, which Jim shared nightly with his children. You are special You are precious You are important And you are lovable I love you And I will always love you I will always take care of you And I will teach you how to take care of yourself. Thank you, Jimmy
July 13, 2025 at 4:12 AM
theotrix.bsky.social
I’m rearranging my office. Chad is helping.
The floor of my office, where a colorful rug lies partially unrolled. Chad the tuxedo cat has shoved himself head-first into the rug roll with only his butt and back foot sticking out.
June 23, 2025 at 9:26 PM
theotrix.bsky.social
jiefcase
A Poshmark listing for “Rare! Vintage 1980s Levi’s briefcase,” a briefcase made from denim that has a Levi’s tag and a jeans butt pocket on the side. It’s $299
June 6, 2025 at 6:05 PM
theotrix.bsky.social
Look at this majestic predator
A large round longhair cat named October Von Spoopypants napping on a loveseat in a pose like a stuffed animal that rolled down the stairs. His fluffy white belly is turned toward the sky, his limbs flopped haphazardly around him, and his head angled back so far that it looks like he’s all nose and half-open mouth. A photo wouldn’t tell you this, but he is snoring. A closer view of Toby’s face, upside down with the whites of his eyes showing and one fang peeking out of his mouth. He ranks among the least dignified animals that have ever walked the earth.
June 5, 2025 at 10:23 PM
theotrix.bsky.social
Baby’s first antique tool restoration 💖
A small antique hand plane hanging on a workshop pegboard, rusty and dusty. Another small metal antique hand plane hanging on a pegboard, this one caked in cobweb-covered sawdust and pitted with rust. The two hand planes after a good cleaning and some time spent scraping off rust. They’re shiny clean and usable now! One is bare steel and one is painted black, which you couldn’t really tell from the previous pictures.
May 23, 2025 at 3:19 AM
theotrix.bsky.social
Yeaaahhhhh
A photo from the wedding cropped down so it only shows my shitty college boyfriend’s hand holding up one of his shitty abstract watercolor paintings. It looks like a kindergartener painted it, and not because it’s abstract—it’s a bunch of clumsily formed shapes in randomly chosen colors, with no sense of composition or meaning. I was already a semi-pro artist at this point, and he would carry his shitty paintings around in his backpack and talk over me to show them off anytime the topic of art came up. I dated that for a year and a half!!
May 20, 2025 at 10:54 PM
theotrix.bsky.social
I fitted the legs and main benchtop of my workbench together for the first time, and all of a sudden it transformed from a little project I’m noodling away at for funzies into a huge piece of hobby-specific furniture??
My work in progress workbench partially assembled. The benchtop is a 3 inch thick reclaimed beam, and the table base has a set of thick legs on each side. It’s not braced yet but is surprisingly sturdy because it’s all traditional joinery! The part I’m proudest of is where legs and benchtop are connected with a mortise and tenon joint (part of the leg sections are wedged all the way through the benchtop). Chiseling through 3 inches of solid wood was a challenge! A side view of the workbench in progress. That thick benchtop only makes up the front half—the back half will have a recessed tool well where my most used tools will live, because I’m a clutter monster and if I don’t make them a home within reach they’ll take over the whole work surface.
May 12, 2025 at 7:49 AM
theotrix.bsky.social
I slept for 17 hours and woke up with no memory of this
“Congratulations, you rescued the 368 chickens in 1120 attempts. Now you have rescued all the chickens you can no longer play the game. Sorry.”
May 9, 2025 at 7:42 PM
theotrix.bsky.social
My spouse made me a Le Poisson Steve 😭
My hand holding up a baseball sized crocheted orange fish with arms and legs made from pipe cleaners
May 4, 2025 at 3:14 AM
theotrix.bsky.social
My spouse has just informed me that every day at breakfast, Chad and Nimbus let the other cats eat first and spend the 30 seconds it takes to get their own food having an animated slap-fight. Every single day. “It’s their morning ritual, slapping each other in the face.”
A tuxedo cat named Chad lounging in a laundry basket A fluffy black cat named Nimbus lounging in the same laundry basket
May 3, 2025 at 7:16 AM