# Any simple clever costume ideas?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702
**Category:** Cafe Society
**Created:** [October 28, 2010, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702 "2010-10-28T20:58:51Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Sitnam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sitnam)
#### Post date: [October 28, 2010, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/1 "2010-10-28T20:58:51Z")
I’m going to a costume party on Sat and I need to dress up. I could go as the standard cop, pirate, doctor, caveman, grim reaper, etc… but perhaps theres a clever alternative out there.
Any good easy-to-make ideas?
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### Author:  [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)
#### Post date: [October 28, 2010, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/2 "2010-10-28T21:02:24Z")
If you are a guy, you could put on your wife’s underwear and go as Colonel Russell Williams.
[/runs away 😃]
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### Author:  [@Jenaroph](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jenaroph)
#### Post date: [October 28, 2010, 9:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/3 "2010-10-28T21:11:27Z")
Mad scientist. Lab coat if you got it (or short sleeved white shirt) with weird stains, rubber gloves, swim goggles, and surgical mask. Spike up your hair all Einstein-like and you’re good to go. Empty the contents of a few glow-sticks into a jar or flask and label it with poison or radiation warnings, for bonus points.
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### Author:  [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)
#### Post date: [October 28, 2010, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/4 "2010-10-28T21:39:53Z")
Tape trash to your clothing and go as a complete mess.
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### Author:  [@Hedda\_Rosa](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hedda_Rosa)
#### Post date: [October 28, 2010, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/5 "2010-10-28T22:03:09Z")
Ok this is a kids costume granted but I think it is funny. [Washing machine](http://familyfun.go.com/crafts/come-clean-washing-machine-669175/).
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### Author:  [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)
#### Post date: [October 28, 2010, 10:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/6 "2010-10-28T22:15:00Z")
I don’t have any suggestions for you, but I have a story about my minimalist costume this year.
My wife and I work for the same company (I’m in IT, she’s an admin.) Wife vetoed all my office party costume ideas for one reason or another. (I pushed hard for Bender and Leela.) Anyway, the back-and-forth went on until there was clearly no time left to pull off anything that I thought might be worth doing - and she settled on going as a mime, because it’s a natural look for her, and she can really rock it. Fair enough.
My costume: Borrowed Postie jacket with 30-second sticker appended:
> [@](#):
>
> **MIME compliant**
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### Author:  [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)
#### Post date: [October 28, 2010, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/7 "2010-10-28T22:22:11Z")
> [@](#):
>
> Tape trash to your clothing and go as a complete mess.
Similar to this, at the department Halloween party one year, the custodian wore an inside-out gray sweatsuit with bits of cotton balls stuck all over it, plus a puffy tail and rabbit ears. She was a dust bunny.
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### Author:  [@trapezoidal\_jellyfish](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/trapezoidal_jellyfish)
#### Post date: [October 28, 2010, 10:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/8 "2010-10-28T22:22:48Z")
I did this once and it was great. People had to ask me what I was, and it sometimes took them a minute to figure it out, but they all laughed.
Wear all black. Black shirt, pants, shoes, gloves, even a hat maybe. Run a line of white masking tape down the side of your arm, up the other side to your armpit, and down the side of your body to the bottom of your foot. Same on the other side of your body. Run a line of tape up the inseams of your pants also. You have essentially made a white masking tape outline of yourself.
Congratulations, you are now a crime scene. Using white chalk might be a little more realistic, but I don’t know how to make sure it doesn’t rub off, so I used tape and it was fine.
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### Author:  [@Morbo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Morbo)
#### Post date: [October 28, 2010, 10:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/9 "2010-10-28T22:23:47Z")
Ala **The Office** : get a Sharpie and write the word “BOOK” across your forehead.
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### Author:  [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)
#### Post date: [October 28, 2010, 10:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/10 "2010-10-28T22:28:41Z")
> [@Jenaroph](#):
>
> Mad scientist. Lab coat if you got it (or short sleeved white shirt) with weird stains, rubber gloves, swim goggles, and surgical mask. Spike up your hair all Einstein-like and you’re good to go. Empty the contents of a few glow-sticks into a jar or flask and label it with poison or radiation warnings, for bonus points.
Be forewarned, while harmless the chemicals inside glow-sticks stink like you wouldn’t believe.
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### Author:  [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)
#### Post date: [October 28, 2010, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/11 "2010-10-28T22:32:04Z")
Hang a potato from your belt in front of your crotch. Tell people you are a dictator.
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### Author:  [@RachelChristine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RachelChristine)
#### Post date: [October 28, 2010, 11:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/12 "2010-10-28T23:15:43Z")
I’m wearing a cute and sexy little pumpkin costume. My husband had a T-shirt made that says 3.14. We are pretty happy with that!
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### Author:  [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)
#### Post date: [October 28, 2010, 11:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/13 "2010-10-28T23:18:11Z")
> [@RachelChristine](#):
>
> I’m wearing a cute and sexy little pumpkin costume. My husband had a T-shirt made that says 3.14. We are pretty happy with that!
You only took it to two digits?
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### Author:  [@pancakes3](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pancakes3)
#### Post date: [October 28, 2010, 11:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/14 "2010-10-28T23:20:30Z")
> [@don\_t\_ask](#):
>
> Hang a potato from your belt in front of your crotch. Tell people you are a dictator.
i. like. this. one.
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### Author:  [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)
#### Post date: [October 28, 2010, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/15 "2010-10-28T23:21:47Z")
A gay friend took an old suit coat and taped pics from NASCAR, Sports Illustrated, pinup models and other ‘macho’ images onto it. It was his “straight jacket”.
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### Author:  [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)
#### Post date: [October 28, 2010, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/16 "2010-10-28T23:23:13Z")
> [@don\_t\_ask](#):
>
> Hang a potato from your belt in front of your crotch. Tell people you are a dictator.
The female equivalent of this is a lemon from the belt- sour puss.
Another oft seen simple classic is covering cereal boxes with fake blood and toting them on a knife- “Cereal Killer”.
And I love the Wednesday Addams line from the first ADDAMS FAMILY movie: “I’m a homicidal maniac, they look just like everybody else”.
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### Author:  [@Typo\_Knig](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Typo_Knig)
#### Post date: [October 29, 2010, 1:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/17 "2010-10-29T01:04:25Z")
Wear a suit and hang a sign from your neck that says “IRS”. :eek:
I took a white long sleeve t-shirt and drew the cholesterol molecule on it. Yes, that shirt made me look fat 😃
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### Author:  [@MacTech](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MacTech)
#### Post date: [October 29, 2010, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/18 "2010-10-29T01:40:35Z")
[Joel, the Bots, and the Mads have a few ideas](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otoOcA_lYNM)
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### Author:  [@Robot\_Arm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robot_Arm)
#### Post date: [October 29, 2010, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/19 "2010-10-29T01:49:43Z")
Wrap some butcher paper around yourself, put on some white facepaint, a belt and a button and you’re [Bill](http://vocalminority.typepad.com/.a/6a00e54f8c22b788340105370e9458970b-320pi).
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### Author:  [@The\_Other\_Waldo\_Pepper](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Other_Waldo_Pepper)
#### Post date: [October 29, 2010, 2:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/any-simple-clever-costume-ideas/558702/20 "2010-10-29T02:35:19Z")
Get a Superman t-shirt. Wear it under an ordinary shirt while decked out in an ordinary suit and tie. Add a pair of glasses and feature a “PRESS” pass noticeably sticking out of your breast pocket or whatever; possibly throw in a notepad. If anyone asks what you’re supposed to be – well, blandly answer that you’re a reporter, and throw in a blank stare, and with any luck you’ll evoke a look of mild disappointment at your half-assed costume.
And when the time is right and all eyes are on you, tilt your head to the side and announce that Lois is in danger as you whip off the glasses and tear open your shirt.
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