Wine and carols at Woolies

It's Christmas Eve in Auckland so I head down to Woolworths to pick up a couple of bottles of turkey-friendly Pinot which I've heard has 40 per cent off.

At the till I'm charged the full price - it turns out the discount only applies if you have a store card - a OneCard as it's known in New Zealand.

A festive shopper in the queue behind me swipes her card through the machine and - just like that - 20 dollars are magically wiped off my bill. I get the discount, she gets the points - everyone's a winner. Hey, it really is Christmas!

I sit outside the store in the sun, eating blueberries and contemplating my good fortune, when suddenly an electric chord strikes up to my left and a keyboard carol breaks forth.

It's two brothers, Tas and Theo. They live nearby and busk outside the store for a few days leading up to Christmas every year. When I ask which charity they're collecting for Tas tells me they'll probably give some to the City Mission but yesterday they spent $140 of it on Christmas presents. They've already made around $300.

Not bad work if you can get it - albeit seasonal. All you need is permission from the store manager - which is pretty easy to get, they tell me - a keyboard and two sets of hands.

Tas is 11 and a real whiz on the keys. He knows heaps of carols by heart and rattles through Little Drummer Boy and Jingle Bells with his eyes closed - my challenge. I tell them I'm afraid I don't have any change ("Hm, a lot of people don't seem to have change..." Theo, who's eight, says wryly) so I buy them a bag of sweets in return for a go on the keys.

I'm a bit rusty so I rope Tas into a duet of Silent Night in the key of C. I take the one-fingered top notes (a tricky sequence, I discover) and just about muddle through. No one throws us any money - or anything else for that matter - but it's fun.

The boys want Lego for Christmas: "we're pretty much a Lego family," Theo tells me seriously.

Suddenly their dad swings round in the family estate car to pick them up. They shove the kit and collection under their arms, jump in and just like that, they're gone. "Happy Christmas, Jennie!" they both shout through the open window as they are whisked away. "See you next year!" I shout back.

And a very Happy Christmas to you too, dear Blog readers.