Thank you. I'm getting onto doing the easy part with clearing the dust out right now, and if that doesn't help with matters, I'll seek out somebody with technical know-how to get the fan replaced.
Also, Laurie, the main reason I'm here complaining about that in the first place is because this whole thing REMINDED me of the unsustainable resource consumption perpetrated by capitalist society. If my post implied it was the sole fault of said economic problems, then I clearly was expressing my thoughts the wrong way. As it often happens when I write these things in the spur of the moment and don't feel like rewriting and thinking every word through for an hour (which is how I usually treat everything I'm about to post). And bringing my distaste for all that up was the original intent of my post, instead of asking for technical advice (which, admittedly, I sorely needed). I didn't expect to get any of that (in fact, I wasn't even expecting a response let alone three of them), since I was merely venting.