I Wanteth My Gregorian Tapestry

Veni Vidi Video: Few people realize it, but MTV is actually hundreds of years old, which may explain Rhino Records’ new four-CD set titled “MTV: The First 1,000 Years.”

Unfortunately, the retrospective ignores the network’s early days--before videos were invented--when MTV relied on music frescoes and music tapestries, which were large artworks designed to accompany Gregorian chants and Gregorian rap songs.

Later innovations included masterpieces like Rembrandt’s “Still Life With Metallica” and Van Gogh’s “Van Halen.” In the late 1800s, the invention of photography led to music daguerreotypes, but not everyone liked the new format. So a rival company called VH1 began creating “Where Are They Now?” portraits of such past stars as Mozart.

You’re So Vein: There are so many injustices in the world. For example, the Census Bureau refuses to count the number of vampires in the U.S.

Luckily, Joel Martin of the Vampire Research Center is lobbying the bureau to include a monster category in next year’s census. Martin’s own records indicate that at least 500 vampires reside in America, mostly in New York City, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Miami. But he believes many others are falling through the cracks because they live in rural areas.

Politics 2000: The list of oddball presidential candidates keeps growing. In addition to Donald Trump, Cybill Shepherd, Warren Beatty, Jesse Ventura and George W. Bush (who now claims he tried cocaine but “didn’t inhale”), we have Dr. Heather Harder, an Indiana woman who brags about being the only candidate endorsed by the ghosts of Abraham Lincoln and Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Weird Polls Bureau: “The Exorcist” has been named the scariest movie of all time, according to a survey in Total Film magazine.

We beg to differ. The scariest movie of all time is anything starring Pauly Shore.

Alarming Trends Bureau: A London-based theater company recently premiered a play that lasts 24 hours. A cast of 10 people takes turns playing the lead role. Originally, one actor was supposed to handle the part, but he reportedly suffered a “serious identity crisis” trying to memorize 24 hours of dialogue.

Audiences might also struggle with the production, but at least it’s not a 24-hour version of “Cats” or “Rent.”

Best Supermarket Tabloid Story: Little-known facts about the United Nations, as recounted in the always reliable Weekly World News:

* On at least 22 occasions since the organization was founded in 1945, representatives of assorted backward nations have traded their homelands to wily colleagues for such trinkets as a malfunctioning boom box, an electric blanket, costume jewelry, Monopoly money or a six-month supply of caramel corn. Fortunately, the swaps were discovered in time to be undone by a vote of the General Assembly.

* Grasshoppers and termites are the “official snack food” of the U.N.

* Dozens of resolutions calling for animal and human sacrifices to end droughts and plagues have been proposed and narrowly rejected on the floor of the General Assembly.

* The official languages of the U.N. are English and French, but drums have been suggested as an “alternative language” 26 times since 1960.

Unpaid informants: Allison Joyce, Wireless Flash News Service, London Times. E-mail Off-Kilter at roy.rivenburg@latimes.com. Off-Kilter runs Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays.