Anthony, maybe I'm a little more awake now.
If the smoke was billowing out as you say for that long, I'm guessing the problem was too much wood smoldering all at once. (Did you put chunks on top of the lit charcoal?)
Is it that big of a concern? Is it subjective and personal preference? Well, I'll give you that it's a LOT harder to ruin your bbq in a wsm than w/ a stickburner (no comparison), but you definately can w/ bad smoke, at least w/ ribs, poultry, and fish.
What's working for me is to bury the chunks in the coals w/ a couple just barely exposed to the lit you pour on top. I don't have to wait that long at all for my smoke to clear up after pouring the lit on. (I'm really more waiting on the temp to come up where I want it.)
You might do a search here as there was some discussion of this, but I think this technique accomplishes a couple of things. First of all, the buried wood seems to have a slower rate of burn. Second, someone here wrote something to the effect that in a fire burning down as w/ the MM, the smoke from the bottom of the "fire" (or the wood we're concerned w/) is "cleaned up" by the combustion of the coals above it. I probably stated that wrong, but it works for me. On my last smoke, my wsm turkey had the best smoke flavor of any I've ever done, and I used two good-sized chunks worth, one apple, one cherry, each split in two. That was probably more than I've ever used when smoking birds on my kettle (wood placed/replaced on top of coals), so it's not just the amount of wood used.