The phone rang. It was one of his friends, who told him there were some people at the Jet Lounge (where Fool DJs regularly) itching to hear some glam rock. Fool scooped up a couple of crates of his finest T. Rex, Sweet and Slade records and hurried on down.

"At the Jet Lounge, they pretty much give me an unlimited supply of Lone Star," Fool says. "I pounded like five or six of 'em, and then I bum-rushed the DJ booth. I told the guy, 'Yo, I'm takin' over.' And once I was in there, I was a terror. This other DJ had a bunch of CDs in there -- and I don't like CDs, I only like vinyl. So I was throwing the guy's CDs everywhere. But he was bein' cool about it. He could see I was on a roll."

Once ensconced in the booth, Fool's drinking only intensified. A steady stream of shots appeared at his side and then vanished down his throat. "Everybody was having a good time, but finally the other DJ told me he was gonna take over again. I was fine with that. By that time, I was too drunk. I was starting to scratch my records and all that crap."

"This," Fool adds, "was where things started to get crazy and out of control."

As you might imagine, Fool's bladder was under some considerable strain. To his immense frustration, there were long lines at all the urinals, and Fool could not or would not wait.

"So I just start pissin' all over the place," he says. "There was this guy in there who said, 'Hey man, this is my friend's bar, fuck you, get out of here,' so I left. The first thing I did when I got out was I confronted the owner -- I said, 'Hey, I just pissed all over your bathroom.' The guy who confronted me in the bathroom was about to tattle on me, but I didn't give him the chance. And she was cool with it. She knew I was on a tear, and that I bring a lot of regulars in there when I DJ. And they knew what they were getting into when they took me on as a DJ there."

But Fool was only getting started. "Right after that, I was drinking a little bit more, and somebody goes, 'Lars from Metallica is here!' And I said, 'That's bullshit. If Lars from Metallica is here, I'll pull out my dick and I'll piss on him!'"

In fact, Lars Ulrich was there. He was in Houston to visit his dad (who lives in Katy) and the Basquiats he had loaned to the Museum of Fine Art.

And Bill Fool is a guy who keeps his promises. "So I was thinking, 'Well, it is Lars, and I gotta keep my word.'"

Trouble was, Fool's gun was empty. He had squandered all his liquid ammo soaking the men's room only moments before. "So I pull out my dick, and I'm thinking 'God, I really need to piss now, but I just pissed all over the bathroom.'"

Meanwhile, word had spread throughout the club that Fool was about to tinkle on Lars Ulrich. As Fool approached the diminutive drummer, penis in hand, flashbulbs were popping all through the smoky haze. That was when he was foiled.

"Somebody who had nothing to do with the Jet Lounge saw me coming," he says. "These guys bum-rushed me. They must have been working for Lars."

Ejected from the club, Fool gathered up his records and headed home. He never got the chance to find someone to give him a ride to his place -- so he walked all the way from the Jet Lounge (a couple of blocks from the Toyota Center) to his apartment near the corner of Main and Houston.

"I was drunk and I was wearing my punk rock clothes -- supertight pants and Creepers, and I was carrying all my records. I just looked like a super-disillusioned junkie or something. At some point a crackhead fell in with me -- he helped me carry my records and he taught me how to buy and smoke crack properly. And at the end of that walk I thought, 'Man, maybe I should go get some crack right now.'"

Fool resisted that urge and passed out. And when he came to the next day, he didn't yet realize that he was famous. "I didn't think too much about it," he says. "I told my old lady and a few of my friends and we had a laugh."

And that's where it would have ended, except Jason Gagnon of the UH Daily Cougar had heard about it. Gagnon, who has contributed to the Press occasionally, called Fool and confirmed the story. And once it hit the Cougar, it blew up worldwide. Today, on the Web, you can find the incident discussed in Arabic, Norwegian, Polish and Catalan.

"It went to Metal Sludge (www.metalsludge.tv), it went to Blabbermouth (www.blabbermouth.net), and from there it just skyrocketed. I had 80 death threats the very next day from Metallica fans all over the world. On the other hand, 90 percent of the people who wrote about it said I was their new hero." (A sampling: "All Hail Bill Fool!", "Bill Fool for President!" and "I wish Bill Fool was my friend.")

Fool was fired for a few days from the Jet Lounge, but they have since reinstated him. As for Ulrich, Fool says he heard through the grapevine that he considered pressing charges. "You'd think he would have a sense of humor," Fool says. "Back in the day you would read these stories about Metallica being fun-lovin' drunks. I guess now they're just old bitter millionaires."

Many of Ulrich's defenders said Fool's attempted pissdown was just an attempt to draw attention to his bands. Fool denies this, and when you think about it, it doesn't make much sense. Both of Fool's bands cited in Gagnon's article -- Bickley and the Down-n-Dirties -- have been defunct for years.

So why did he do it? Was it because he hated Metallica? Was it because of the band's famous anti-Napster stance? Was it the tinny snare sound on St. Anger? No, no, and no. The fact is, it just seemed like a good idea at the time. "I was never that much into Metallica and I don't give a shit about the Napster thing -- I never used it. It was just that I was drunk, and I decided I was gonna fuckin' piss on Lars. And if I saw him now, I would challenge him to a pissing contest. I'd say, 'Fuck it. Let's do it, man.'"