Rationalizations as Substitute for a Costume

I had been traveling so incessantly that I didn't have time to don the costume I had planned for tonight's party: I was going to be the health careless plan. I didn't have time to get the IV set up with high fructose corn syrup in the bag, cigarettes in the shirt pocket, etc. So instead, I dressed normally, wearing a little flip book around my neck, the cover instructing people to "Lift tabs for costume explanations," something which revealed the following for those patient enough (and as it turns out, comfortable enough in my personal space) to turn through the tabs.

• Oh, I’m wearing a costume. It’ll just take you a couple of generations to realize it.
• As usual, I could not think of what to do – only what to say. I don’t have a costume but I do have a series of implausible excuses.
• I lost my costume in a really elaborate Ponzi scheme. You’re just lucky that I’m still dressed.
• This is not a costume. It’s a disguise. I’m in a federal witness protection plan and no longer answer to the name Vinnie.
• We’re all wearing costumes all the time. It is only on Halloween that anyone realizes what they’re doing.
• I am from the future, wearing a period costume from the early 21st century. Sadly, I cannot prove it simply because my costume is so realistic.
• I am an anthropologist of costumology. I am here to study you and your kind.
• I’M GOING AS MY OWN CELEBRITY. GIVEN THIS DELUSIONAL PREMISE, I DON’T FEEL ANY MORE COMPELLED TO WEAR A COSTUME THAN NIXON WOULD TO WEAR A NIXON MASK.
• I can’t believe that you’re still thumbing through my lame excuses for not wearing a costume.
• Oh please. You don’t think this is what I really look like, do you?
• WHAT DO YOU THINK OF MY NEW, FULL BODY SPORTS JACKET AND JEANS TATTOO?*
• Oh!?! Traditional costume party?! I thought the invitation said traditional customs party. Pity, really, because I had finally decided to learn this culture.**

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* thank you Beth
** thank you Allen