Lately I've been having trouble starting the bike, partly due to cold weather and a crappy battery.  However this morning, I couldn't get her started at all, even off my truck's battery.  I looked her over this afternoon and found the following symptoms.

1.  Oil in the air filter box.  I've read this somewhat normal, but my bike hasn't done that before.

2.  moderately fresh oil around the exhaust manifold, small buildup.

3. fairly new sparkplug (about 7 months and 2000 miles old) was fouled up with oil deposits.  Replaced the plug, she starts up right nice again.

4. Lately I've been going through oil fairly quickly, about 3/4-1 quart a month.  (I've been however driving ALOT more recently too, about 1000 miles in the past 30 days).

She runs pretty darn well, idles nice and low, feels pretty much exactly the same as when I bought her, no stalls or engine stutter.   I did get her pretty hot a while back cruising down the expressway, melted my shoe to the engine casing and it turned just a slight shade of gold.  Been alot more gentle on her since.

I'm guessing I've probably damaged the piston ring, maybe even the piston.  Opinion? theory?

Check your compression.
Are you hearin' a knock?
You might have burnt the piston.
melting your shoe against the case is pretty hot.

Then just keep an eye on it....    70+mph for extended periods will use some oil,.. that's normal for a big a/c thumper...
The head leak is probably the usual oil plug leak... Do a search if you want to fix that,... or wait 'till it gets bad....