Linda Herrick: Years younger for a day

The other day I was walking through one of Auckland's swankier department stores and a young lady presented me with a tiny box containing a teeny tube of face cream. "Anti-ageing cream", the package boasted. It was free ... but why me? Was this a message? Can one tiny tube of cream fight ageing?

Of course not. I used it all up in one go, and there was no miracle. But the full price of the product, should I care to make a purchase, would definitely make me worry - very ageing.

Later that same night, with the debut of 10 Years Younger, the full anti-ageing arsenal was lined up, under the command of songster and former NZ Idol judge Fiona McDonald.

The concept for this fluffy piece of pointlessness is, of course, modelled on a British programme that screened here recently. It trades on insecurity and unrealistic dreams fuelled by fashion magazines and the billion-dollar cosmetic industry.

Anyway, here, a dentist, a beautician, a make-up artiste, a hairdresser and a fashion stylist cast their beady eyes over a wreck of a woman called Caroline. A wreck, probably, for the simple reason she has four kids.

She must have been desperate because the humiliation was piled on. Fiona made her stand in the middle of Vulcan Lane in broad daylight and invited passers-by to assess her age. She was, I think, 35. The average assessment was mid-to-late-40s. Caroline was shocked.

The ordeal continued, as the experts harrumphed over the symptoms of her naughty smoking. Her face was too long, she had frown lines, dark teeth, hair on her chin, and her complexion - shriek! Sallow! Washed-out!

She put up with all this with quivering chin and tear-filled eyes, and the treatment began. Aside from the kindly dentist, who brightened trembling Caroline's gnashers, the panel of experts was pretty scary. The fashion stylist tried to make her wear ridiculous too-young clothes, then moaned because Caro wasn't playing along. The Botox lady gave her horribly swollen lips, as though she'd been in a punch-up. Caroline could barely speak properly.

The hair-stylist promised a Meg Ryan look, but it was more like a limp pudding basin cut. Caroline was by no means convinced. And, just as the make-up lady was advising against too much muck on the face, she trowelled it on.

The immediate - and temporary - result was quite spectacular, you'd have to say, as the mother-of-four once more ventured into Vulcan Lane and presented her visage for assessment. She'd lost at least a decade, and it was hugs and kisses all round.

But what happens when she returns home to the kids, the fags, the inability (if she's anything like me and a million others) to master all that hair product, powders and paint? Caroline was happy for a day - but a holiday might be more beneficial.

Later that night, we had to farewell David McPhail's fabulous creation, Mr Gormsby. In the series finale, Mr Gormsby was booted out of the school, the victim of downsizing, reviews, PC and Geraldine Brophy. He took it on the chin, barked out some useful epithets about the value of learning, then marched off to his trusty Rover. As he swung through the gates, the boys saluted him with a resounding haka.

Thanks to Mr Gormsby's stern style of teaching, they'd undergone their own form of makeover. But unlike the sad ethos of 10 Years Younger, which seeks to turn back the clock, these boys had moved forward. They had grown up.