Perfectly Normal.  ( and discussed repeatedly.)

The bike was set lean atthe factory.  It's still lean.

You can eliminate the random pops and bangs by following the carb tuning guide found in the tech section.

For a bone stock bike, I would recommend what I did: Drill out the plug over the idle-air screw, add a 55 pilot, 147.5 main and 2/3 spacer mod (reduce its thickness by 1/3).  Then set your idle air-fuel mix with the air-screw to get the idle smoothed out.  

If you go to a K&N drop in, you will have to again adjust accordingly (55 pilot, 150 or 152.5 main and 1/2 spacer) etc.

It's actually a very easy carb to tune, once you get over the apprehension and you finally take a screwdriver to it.
Good luck!

Thank you Skrapiron, I thought it was normal, just never noticed it before.

As far as you Islandwahine, how could I leave out the ladys.  Every thorn needs a rose.

It's lean (I think you knew that though),  your finger should come out with slight soot.  Brown'ish gray to light gray.   Just not black.

And,   If you want to reduce popping, shift earlier.....smoother