REGRETS, I've had a few. One of them involved deciding I couldn't be bothered dieting or exercising before my wedding. After 12 long hours stuffed into a bodice I could barely breathe in, and I realised that, on balance, fewer servings of nachos in the run up to the big day might have been a good idea. There'll be no such regrets for the couples who are participating in Bride & Grooming.

This new series has been set up to offer people "a life-changing cosmetic transformation" in the weeks before they walk up the aisle. Those of a charitable mindset might think it's really nice of the kind TV company to help these young hopefuls look their best on the big day; the rest of us can see that combining pre-wedding jitters with a couple of sessions under the knife is a sure-fire ticket to reality TV heaven. I mean really, as if you don't have enough to worry about between table plans and floral arrangements without having to cross your fingers and hope that the swelling from your nose job will have gone down before the official photographer arrives.

Still, the lure of a younger face being immortalised in the wedding album is clearly enough to make people sign on the dotted line. Clair and Wayne were the victims, sorry, participants, in the first experiment. They seemed like nice people, although Wayne had a bit of a complex about looking old enough to be Clair's Dad. He had a point. Some people's faces tell their life story. Wayne's seemed to suggest he might be a reformed alcoholic who had spent time in the boxing ring. But really, it's what's on the inside that counts, right?

Before you could say "don't you want a bit more time to think about it?" Wayne was booked in for Botox and a facelift, while Clair was "looking forward" to a boob job, nose job, dental surgery and laser eye treatment. There was one big question on my mind: would their three young children recognise them once they'd been nipped and tucked?

As expected there were yukky squeamish bits, particularly during the nose job - is there really any reason why plastic surgeons are still using tools that look as if they've come from an iron-age forge? Clair got a horribly bloodshot eye and, post-surgery, Wayne bore an uncanny resemblance to Frankenstein's monster. Had it really been worth it? Well, actually, the answer was yes. Clair looked like a supermodel and Wayne's life history was no longer etched quite so deeply on his mug. Will it improve their chances of having a happy marriage? Probably not.

Reality schmality, what we really want to see on screen is good drama. On Thursday nights it gets delivered in the form of House, where Hugh Laurie lives it up as a brilliant but antisocial New Jersey doc. Laurie has won a Golden Globe for his performance, but for me the sign that he's really doing well is when I temporarily forgot he was British. How could that be possible? The most English of English comedians now walks and talks like a genuine American. He even looks more Hollywood, designer stubble and all. This week's episode was House by numbers. A patient kept almost dying, only to be revived for a few more hours to give House and his merry band a chance to figure out what was wrong. The fun thing about House is that most of us have absolutely no chance of solving the mystery during the programme. Unlike an obvious whodunit, you'd need to watch it with a laptop, Googling symptoms and rare illnesses to have a chance to solve the case. So it's nice just to sit back and watch them do the hard work. Who knew that anaphylactic shock, paralysis and heart failure could all be caused by a tic? It's educational and escapist all at once. And did I mention that Hugh Laurie looks really good? Amazing.

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