Thanks mucho for the advice, gents. I should have been a bit more specific w/ the issue. The "popping up" is not normal/correct, or at least, it's not simply the spring rebounding. It's a single pop up action. Not a fluid rebound of the spring. One single, very notchy pop. Not as in the sound, but the motion. It jerks up, not spring up. Also, this is not for the entire motion and it doesn't do it all the time. Best case i can give you is as follows:
Come to a stop on a level road surface, bike dives a bit and then comes to rest (suspension is fully rebounded). Then i turn the front wheel slightly and pop -- a notchy last inch or two of travel upwards. It's like the spring is binding, but it never does it when in motion (I'm hypersensitive to anything i feel through the handlebars). It's almost like there's not enough fluid in, but at this point, I'm positive there's at a minimum 285cc per side, probably closer to 290-295ish.
If you honestly feel a heavier weight oil would alleviate this, I'll give it whirl, i simply thought a heavier weight would create a situation where it made it more difficult to compress the shock and not much more. Thanks again.
Oh and no, i did not take the wheel off to do it -- just followed all the helpful hints on this site. Seals appear good or else I would have just pulled it all apart and rebuilt. Bike only has 15k and seems really well looked after so I don't necessarily suspect anything is worn/broken -- I just like to make things perfect.