Here is my attempt at your request. I use Adobe Lightroom 2 and copy .nef and convert them to .dng files. Honestly, I don't know if any of this work is worth it. Sometimes, I find that I do have a better picture in the end. Sometimes.... eh. Honestly, I think I would rather just click and forget about it. Post process takes too much time. But I wont get better with out trying.
I did a slight adjustment to the color temp. Did an Auto adjustment. Then made some color adjustments.. basically trying to make the blues blue and the greens green. The pic out of your D40 did an excellent job and there isn't much difference in what I am posting here. And then did a sharpen and exported as a jpg at 240 dpi. Click the pic to see it full size, which I think allows you to see a bit more of the detail in the process. But honestly, it looks the same.
I have gigs and gigs of photos as raw and it is with just the basic fear that in 10 years, there will be killer photo software and those pics of my baby girl will all of a sudden be STUNNING. Who knows though... its cheap insurance. Storage is cheap.
Good luck