Believe it or not. My Favourite way of getting solder off of the pads, since I was very young, was (and maybe still is), Cutting about 40cm of Telephone or Comms cable, pulling out the cores. Then Heat the pad up, put the 'pipe' up to the pad, and breathe in through it.
I used to love the burning in my lungs when I did that. I still think it works better than Mechanical Suckers or Wicking....