Washing the car definitely angers the rain gods. To a lesser extent, planning outdoor activities on your one and only free day can occasionally provoke some precipitation.
Hanging out laundry can also be a trigger, in the same way that when you toss the last load into the dryer, the sun will reappear.
The British Newark (English, rather, as I once went to a place called Newark Castle in the region of Glasgow) is the one I’m in. I’m not 150 years old, though. Moderately rustic, perhaps.
It’s one of those ideas people reference even though it’s not expected that anyone will believe it to be factually true, like telling kids that if the wind changes their face will stay like that, or the idea that Nottingham has five women for every man. That’s probably a local one.
Most recently I overheard it in a shop, but I got the reference, as, obviously, did the person saying it and the person it was being said to. It’s the sort of thing where you can say it and expect people to understand what you mean.
I suppose this thread has established that it’s obscure anywhere else, though.
Whenever my dad heard someone singing badly or off-key, he would make the comment “Must be going to rain… I hear the shit-bird singing.” (Or maybe it was “whistling”?) I have no idea what that’s supposed to mean, but then most of my dad’s sayings never really made a lot of sense.