I just delt with that in my 2000, I changed it out yesterday. It got progresivly worse until I had to decide what to listen to in the morning because it would not take a different Cd if it had been on any amount of time.
my 02 used to do that it would refuse to eject if it had been on an hour or so, seems teh heat caused to to swell or something, anyway a credit card stuck into the slot and gently lift the cd edge and it POP out, i think the lift tray gets slack