Answer:
A "The spring of 1998 was the Halley’s Comet of desert wildflower years." (lines 1–2)
Explanation:
This is the excerpt from Barbara Kingsolver's scientific essey "Called Out". It describes events in the spring of 1998 and gives insight on magnificent and complex life cycle of desert plants.
The given sentence provides description of the highway medians suggesting that there were unusually many flowers, rarely seen before.
That provides evidence to answer A. which claims that that spring was the Halley's Comet of desert wildflower years. Halley's Comet is a rare phenomenon that happens only once every 76 years, so by making this comparison, the author claims that what happened that spring was a true botanical rarity.
Lets begin with the definition of an idiom:
An idiom is a widely used saying or expression that contains a figurative meaning that is different from the phrase's literal meaning. For example, if you say you're feeling “under the weather,” you don't literally mean that you're standing underneath the rain.
To me "under the weather" means not feeling well, my assumption being that the rain is the symbolism for sadness.
If anyone still wants to know what the answer is it should be : "Nosy implies that Emma has ulterior motives for asking about Jack’s project; curious implies that she is genuinely interested."