Hi Thomas -

It's almost certainly your blower motor. The lack of air and occasional grinding from the base of the windshield pretty much convicts the blower motor. More than 200K is a very good lifetime for those things.

The blower motor is replaced from under the hood, not inside the car. You don't have to disassemble the dash. Instead, you have to remove the windshield wiper, it's motor, and transmission. It 's really not all that bad a job. Try using the search function to find some relevant threads - I know it's been discussed here a million times.

When your windows fog up, does it have a sickly-sweet smell? If so, then your heater core is certainly leaking. This is cause for some concern, as the glycol used as anti-freeze is quite a hazardous poison, especially when inhaled as a vapor. I wouldn't mess around with this one - park the car until you can get it repaired. As an alternative, you can try one of those stop leak compounds for radiators. I almost hate to suggest such a thing, but Larry Bible, of all people, used it to stop a leak in his 300E heater core, and it worked for years.

Best of luck,

- JimY