Changeling said:
Now lets suppose I really screw up, and I'm faced with a worst case scenario of polishing compound/wax/whatever packed in the body panel gaps and stuck under trim/whatever!
How do I proceed to straighten out my negligent mess.
Heh heh, I'm tempted to say something smart-aleck like "that's like asking 'how do I clean my fingernails after I soak my hands in a can of housepaint?' " 'cause I'm pretty confident that you won't mess up that badly (and if you do the excess product might not be the worst of your troubles). But OK
Excess SG isn't an issue. Breathe on it to fog the surface with your breath (condensation) and buff it off. If necessary (i.e., if it's really thick) use some QD on your MF.
AIO- dunno, I've never let an excessively heavy application dry. I generally buff AIO off before it's completely dry, but when it has been dry it still buffed right off, no problems. You could try the QD here, too.
IMO the real problems could come from the polishes.
If you let the polish dry on some plastic trim and get white staining you'll have to really *scrub* it with a solvent and something like a brush. This will be hard to do without marring the adjacent paint. Products made to remove dried wax from such surfaces would come in handy. Cleaning the trim with AIO *might* provide a simple solution, but don't bank on it.
If you get goofy-excess product in a gap/under trim I'd use a plush MF saturated with Meguiar's #34 Final Inspection QD to remove it. You might have to be inventive to figure out a way to get at the problem. You *might* be able to wash it off with a heavy shampoo mix, but I've never tried it with those products. I"ve always been able to clean up any OOPSes with plenty of #34 to soften it and the MF (or a toothpick or something) to mechanically loosen it.
To be honest, this isn't a problem I can recall ever having encountered, at least not to any significant degree. Having *that* much product on the pads just isn't something that one oughta do. Armed with that knowledge, and paying close attention to what you're doing and what's going on, it won't be an issue for you either. Since this stuff isn't *literally* fool-proof, just don't be foolish and you'll be OK (hence I suspect you're gonna be OK

).
Check/cleand and dry your pads from time to time and watch that there isn't too much product on them. Think about how the pads move and how product could get into places where you don't want it. In short, just do plenty of high-grade thinking and pay attention to what you're doing and what's going on.
Maybe tape off that first panel you do so you don't have to worry about any more than the actual polishing of the paint for the first hour or so.