I have a 0.35mm nozzle that when it extrudes the molten filament will curl up and try to melt onto the nozzle. I read somewhere that this is behaviour of a partially clogged nozzle.

1) What is the best way to clear a PLA blockage?

2) I am going to be switching to ABS in a few weeks so what is the best way to clear that blockage?

3) I have a rubbery makeup pad remover slit and surrounding the filament after it leaves the reel to try and wipe any dust off of it but it does not seem to work, what are some ideas for cleaning as your printing?

Easiest way is to slightly warm the nozzle (to say 70 C for PLA) and then back the filament out. That will usually pull everything out of the nozzle. I tend to get curling PLA even with a completely clear nozzle though, it shouldn't affect print quality.

With the nozzle hovering 30mm or so above the bed, what happens when you manually extrude maybe 10 mm's of Filament?

Waitaki: Usually the filament will drop strait down and start to coil on the print bed. Sometimes the filament will bend upward and if it touches the nozzle then it will just start to clump on the nozzle tip until I wipe it off. Usually I just pull the clump off the nozzle with tweezers and every so often I wipe off the sides of the nozzle with some steel wool.