1. Fizz can't help but think the Securities and Exchange Commission should take a look at this graph . It seems highly suspicious to us.



Last Thursday morning, several hours before the Boeing tanker news was announced, the company's stock price soared over $2, from a little above $70 to over $72. Did somebody have inside information?

Highlighting the abnormal spike, the price eventually fluttered back down to earth after a day's worth of normal trading balanced out the suspiciously keen run on Boeing stock in the morning.  (The tanker news wasn't announced until after the market closed on Thursday—and the price, appropriately, blasts off as trading starts on Friday.)

But given that Boeing itself thought the deal wasn't going its way, Fizz wonders who was savvy enough to grab up that much stock on Thursday morning without some inside info.

2. Speaking of the Boeing deal: While all of the Washington delegation wants credit for getting Boeing's back, U.S. Rep. Norm Dicks (D-WA, 6) may be the real star here.

While Boeing's rival EADS was offering a bigger fuel tanker for a lower price, Dicks made that work against the European company.

The New York Times spelled it out on Friday:

In the end, the proposed size of the aerial fueling plane offered by Boeing’s rival, the European Aeronautic Defense and Space Company, or EADS, seemed to work against it. And Boeing may have won, several analysts said, because its jet could save billions of dollars more in flying costs than any discounts EADS might have offered on its sticker price.

Perhaps the most decisive advantage occurred through a change advocated by one of Boeing’s biggest supporters, Representative Norm Dicks, Democrat of Washington. Mr. Dicks said that after the earlier bidding collapsed, he persuaded the Pentagon to alter a crucial rule to better reflect the long-term cost of the planes.

Under the change, the Air Force agreed to project the cost of the fuel used to power the tankers over a 40-year period, rather than 25 years. Air Force officials have said that the lengthier projections made sense, given that many of its tankers have already been operating for 50 years.

Mr. Dicks promoted the change publicly before the latest bidding started, and EADS officials said on Friday that they knew about it. But they say it was one of several rule changes that could help explain how Boeing, America’s top aerospace firm, reversed its prospects on the bid after faltering so badly in 2008.

3. Yesterday was declared John T. Williams Day by the city at a ceremony at the Chief Seattle Club in Pioneer Square, where about 120 people gathered for a standing-room-only event as the proclamation was read by Deputy Mayor Darryl Smith, pictured below.

Also on hand: SPD Chief John Diaz and Williams' brother Rick, pictured together in the front row here. The crowd appreciated that Diaz was on hand.













Photos, Copyright Sean Balch, 2011

4. Also this weekend: Planned Parenthood staged a march to protest the budget in D.C. which, thanks to the Republican-controlled house, now defunds the women's health care non-profit.

Cola shutterbug Sean got some great pictures there too.

We ran a couple over the weekend . Here are a few more: