Oh shit!!! My laptop had similar issues with one of its fans; I really didn't care about the error messages and kept rocking Assassin's Creed 4, so my laptop (which behaves like a bad-tempered wife to me) decided to kick me in the hinies and screw up my main AMD graphics card. Now, all I can do is watch movies and play Contra 4 (and I usually have a fan pointed at the laptop and blowing away)...
... so I feel your pain, clearly. Best of luck fixing the fan. Hope your 'hiatus' is a really short one.