The dreaded engine light came on yesterday morning as I set off to work

Nothing seemed wrong and the bike was pulling as good, if not better (!) than normal so I carried on. I called Ducati Manchester and they asked if anything was unusual but to pop down anyway and they'll see what error code has been given.
The only thing I could think was when you switch on the ignition. Normally I hear a "zeep - zeep" noise, now I hear a quiet but much slower "z e e e e p". Apparently that's the exhaust damper valve initialising, and it sounds like it's got stuck and thrown up an error. Not surprising given the crappy road conditions at the moment. So they wheeled the bike round to the workshop to sort it out. Unfortunately it turns out it's not stuck at all, but the operating cable has snapped at the nipple. Fortunately the damper is sprung loaded to stay fully open so it won't cause a problem until they can get the part and fix it (if it was partly shut it would be more of a problem apparently). The bike seems to have lost a bit of its sparkle but I'm only running in Urban mode in quite busy traffic for now.
Then I remembered I did hear a clang the other day but with all my gear on I wasn't sure where it came from. I'm very happy with Ducati Manchester and their efforts to get it sorted within a day

So In summary; the "zeep - zeep" is your exhaust damper
