The Ducati Monster List web site (http://www.ducatimonster.org/) is full of interesting chatter about riding and modifying monsters. It has one unpleasant side effect though - if you spend even a few minutes on the site you tend to get excited about making changes to the bike. Things that you previously didn't even notice, now really really bug you. The #emissions_cannister for example

Spare parts catalog - http://www.ducati.com/bikes/catalogs.jhtml;MY=2002

Hacks

reflectors

Everyone removes the reflectors from the front forks. I hadn't noticed until I read about it, and then sure enough they started to bug me. They're nasty little plastic things stuck on with double-sided tape. They're clearly tacked on at the last minute to meet some regulation or other. The good news is that they're easy to remove with a hair dryer and a little elbow grease. One almost fell off, the other needed a little convincing with a screwdriver. Afterwards the forks needed a little cleanup with some alcohol to get rid of the crusty glue that the adhesive tape had left behind.

gas tank stickers

Again, a little heat with a hair dryer and some careful peeling got the two gas tank stickers up. A better idea than the hair dryer is to just leave the bike in the sun for an hour or two - I'd bet this will heat the tank more than the hair dryer.

I stuck the stickers on the inside cover of my owner's manual just so I have them for reference.

emissions cannister

Purely cosmetic, but it's surprising how much better it looks when it's done.

http://www.ducatimonster.org/faq/faq_emissions.html

http://pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/jerseyjeffshinn/album?.dir=c233&.src=ph&store=&prodid=&.done=http%3a//pg.photos.yahoo.com/ph/jerseyjeffshinn/my_photos

exhaust

You can hack on the stock exhausts to make them louder: http://home.earthlink.net/~desmoduck/muffler_mod.html

Or you can pay someone to do it: http://www.ducatipipemod.com/