I'd agree with everything here. People don't really care, that's the thing. I mean, when you were drinking, did you care? My usual approach is to pat my stomach and go, 'Trying to lose a bit of that!' which at least has the advantage of being partly true.
One thing I've realised really recently -- like, this morning -- about these big social events is that though I now dread going to them sober, I also used to dread going to them drunk, because they usually went pear-shaped because of it. Looking back I can't actually think of a single social event at which I was drinking that there wasn't at least one sour note because of me drinking. That kind of off-the-leash, unmonitored drinking always brought out the very worst in me. I think I just have to accept that social events are not my natural habitat, either way, and move on, nothing to see here.