Clustering in talkative, esoteric local groups such as The Astronomy Connection and the San Jose Astronomical Association, the true star-searchers gather excitedly. By day, they work as anything from college students to software engineers to music teachers. Montebello Open Space Reserve in the Palo Alto hills, Pacheco State Park near Hollister, even the soccer field at the back of Van Meter Elementary School in Los Gatos. This is not a profession for many of them, it is an exercise in pure joy. And, of course, more wet weather is expected to saturate the valley.
Many local astronomers say they have a regular rainy-day ritual.
Curse a lot. Pray for clear skies. Clean their disassembled scopes. Pray the skies don't clear up while their scopes are still disassembled so they'll have to hurry up and assemble them again and run out to catch a glimpse of the sky. Often they work on their equipment.