any way to clear the formatting of a row just to the right of the table it's in?

Not 100% sure this is what you mean, but...

If your table is in A1:J200, and you want to clear the formatting from column K to the end (right side) of the worksheet for just row 18, then select cell K18. While holding down CTRL+SHIFT, tap the right arrow key. As long as there are no cells with data to the right, this will select K18:IV18 (or K18:XFD18 for newer versions of Excel with more columns). You can then adjust or clear the formatting of those cells. (Home > Editing > Clear > All | Formats | Contents.. etc.)

hmm.. maybe it's my older version of excel that's the problem but hitting right at the end does nothing, but left causes the selection to go from the entire row to just the cells WITHIN the table. Maybe someone else will know...

no biggie, I'm just cleaning it up and otherwise I'll have to clear the whole rows then reformat them and I used to have a habit of formatting entire rows.