newb q: date.format(); error

[$var]

Hello!
I am an eager JavaScript newbie, but I am sad to report that I am still green when it comes to trouble shooting.

Today I am rejigging a colleagues countdown function to display a different time format. I googled have to do this, and retrieve multiple instances telling me that myDate.format('m/dd/yy'); should do the trick.

However, I am receiving this error in firebug:
"startYear.format is not a function"

It fails at the second line of this function:

var startYear = new Date();	
	startYear.format('m/dd/yy');
	startYear = new Date(2010, 2, 14, 22-hourOffset, 0, 0);
	$(document).ready(function() {
		$('#jqueryClock').countdown({until:startYear, compact: true, description: '', onExpiry: itsStarting, alwaysExpire: true});
		runElecChange();
	});

Thank you for looking!