Congrats! And yeah, pledge is furniture polish. The idea that it's some kind of miracle bike cleaner is silly. It washes away in moments when the rain hits, for instance. But if you don't give that much of a crap and just want the bike to not be completely unsightly it's a nice lazy guy's makeshift.
Really nice work on those rims. I had to literally take mine off, wetsand them down and then machine polish to get a result like that, but they were a bit older no doubt.