Weirdest problem I've ever seen and I'm desperate for advice...

Okay. Here's a strange one. I've never seen anything like this before.

I have a '94 Sunbird btw.

Anyway, the problem is that I cannot take my key out of the ignition. Not only can I not remove the key, but I also cannot turn the key forward to start the car, nor can I turn the key back to turn the car off. In fact, it's stuck in the acc position. So it's in that "middle" area (radio on, engine off), and I cannot remove the key no matter what.

I tried everything I could think of to get that key out, and nothing worked, so I just disconnected the battery. Some of the things I tried were shifting in and out of park, turning the steering wheel back and forth (which did nothing, because the steering wheel wouldn't lock up I guess that's because the ignition was in acc), changing the fuses, etc.

I'm clueless as to what is causing this. And I'm about to pull my hair out because I now have to commute to work and take my wife and kids around in a very undependable jalopy with a spare tire attached to the driver's side rear (my '90 Buick Century) and driving that thing's got me worried. But I have no choice right now. :frown:

Here's a little background on how this whole thing started with the Sunbird. About a month or so ago, I had a tire blow out (the rear passenger tire) and I had it replaced with a tire that was slightly smaller than the original (had it replaced at a truck stop at midnight as an emergency and I didn't realize how much unbalance it was causing so I didn't get a different one). So I drove around on too small of a tire for hundreds of miles over the past month.
Then a few days ago, I had the right sized tire put on instead. As soon as that tire was put on (by a friend...who I watched during the whole process), the key got stuck in the ignition, but I was able to start the car, I just couldn't turn it off. Well, after a few hours of screwing with it, I found a little trick to allow me to turn the car off and remove the key. While the car was running, I would verrrrry slowly and carefully turn the key FORWARD while pressing on the brake, and then it seemed to reset or something, which allowed me to turn the car off and remove the key. That trick worked fine for almost a week, and it even seemed as though it had even totally corrected itself...for two days straight I had no problem removing the key . It seemed like it was back to normal.

But then last night, my thermostat died on me. I pulled it out, no big deal....car stopped overheating. BUT, then after fixing that, I noticed that a radiator hose had come loose. So tonight I fixed the radiator hose, and then I was about to turn the car on to see if the leak was still present or not.....BUT, when I put the key in, I wasn't able to turn it all the way forward, AND I wasn't able to turn it back.....it was then stuck in the middle acc position as it still is now.

Any ideas on what the problem is? I know I'm probably going to have to take it to the shop, but I really can't afford that right now. If I take it to the shop, I'll have to get a small loan to pay for it.
I'm hoping that there is SOME way I could manually unlock the ignition, perhaps even if that entails somehow opening up the steering column or whatever I'd need to do. But I don't know where on this car I would start to take off the cover area around the ignition because I don't see any way to remove it without destroying it.
As you can tell, I'm desperate at this point. :confused:

I'm pretty sure that the tire and ignition problems are coincidental. One issue with the steering columns in the 90-94 j-bodies is with the rack and gear that goes from the ignition cylinder to the actuating rod for the ignition switch. As they wear, they will start to jam up. The repair kit # from GM is 7844651. This is what would be used to repair a severely worn or stolen car's column that had been punched by the thief.

yeah i would go with wut he said. try this take some like wd40 or something and spray itbetween the gap inbetween the column and the part where u put your key.