Recipes for Disaster: an anarchist cookbook

You can also make paint bombs from balloons themselves. Use water balloons, which were designed to hold fluid: any other balloons may be too small or weak, and can burst when you least expect it. Carefully protect the area in which you will produce them, as it's easy to make a big mess; work with a partner. You need each balloon to have enough air in it that it will break against the target, and enough paint that it will leave a mark without being too heavy to throw. First, blow up the balloon to contain more air than you ultimately need, as some of the air will escape during the filling process. Next, using a two cycle fuel mixer or some other tool that can function as an enormous syringe, fill the balloon with the right amount of paint, supporting the bottom of the balloon as you do and being careful not to let too much air out {figure 10.6}. When the balloon contains the right proportions of air and paint, pinch its mouth, pull out the filling tool, and tie off the end. Make sure there's no paint lefl: on you from the production process when you go to apply

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balloon paint bombs. Transport them in sealed plastic bags, and throw them like you would throw a football, so they roll off your fingers to spiral through the air.

Finally, if the target you have in mind is small or doesn't need much paint, you can fire paint gun pellets from a slingshot.

Decorating Glass You can find glass etching solution or cream at some arts and crafts stores, though it may be locked up behind the counter. It can be used to frost glass?but be careful, you do not want this stuff^to touch your skin! You can put the liquid form in a shoe polish applicator or similar device, and apply it through the sponge on the end to write a message or just make a smear across corporate windows you want replaced. It sure attracts less attention than a baseball bat! If you can't get that close, put it in a spray bottle. To apply it from an even greater distance, you'll need an eggshell or a light bulb?don't use a Christmas tree ornament, as they are so thin that the fluid eats through them. If you're using an eggshell, stick a hole in one end of the shell and drain it; fill it with the cream or fluid, and close the hole with electrical tape without wrapping the egg in it. If you're using a light bulb, unscrew the bottom of the bulb or pry a hole in it, fill it with the etching solution, and use electrical tape to seal the bottom before throwing. Make sure not to leave any fingerprints. Consider using this method to frost the windshields of certain vehicles and the glass screens of certain machines, as well as the plate glass of corporate storefronts.

You can also wrap emery cloth around your finger to write quickly on glass or stainless steel.

Graffiti 264

Once you've been involved in graffiti long enough to get your bearings, consider gradu- Refining Your Medium ating from spray paint cans and prefabricated paint markers to making your own equipment and mixing your own colorants. The two most common media you can use for this are bucket paints and inks or dyes. The two types do not mix with each other.

Bucket paint comes in a wide variety of colors; Rustoleum is one common brand. It is not as permanent as many inks, but it usually will not weather away quickly. Make sure you get oil- or "solvent"-based paint. You can't put paint in most markers, so try putting it in a shoe polish applicator or similar tool. If you want more drips, thin out the paint with mineral spirits. Do not use a thinner, such as xylene, that destroys plastic, if you plan to use a plastic applicator.

Ink is known for staining harder than paint. In the United States, Marsh and Pilot are two well-known brands. Just about every ink is alcohol-based, as is leather dye. Ink generally looks good on a wall, flows well through a marker, and is difficult to remove. By itself, leather dye doesn't look very impressive, and doesn't flow as well as ink, but you can mix ink and leather dye together to get stunning colors that are extremely diflicult to remove. Be careful when handling this mixture?it is as challenging to clean off" a surface in your home as it is in the street. To take things even farther, you can add brake fluid. Brake fluid is corrosive and eats through paint, just as etching solution does to

glass, making for an even more permanent mark. Make sure you get DOT3 brake fluid. has already been painted Keep it off your hands, and don't add too much to your mixture.