Smoking like a camp fire

Gents -
I had to replace the valve cover gaskets and in doing so I obviously yanked off the upper intake manifold. Upon reassembly she wouldn't hold idle and stalled out almost immediately. Code 34, EGR voltage low is the only thing that came up and I've had that code for a while with no issues. I tried starting her about 10 times.
I disconnected the IAC and she started strong and idled well... until smoke started pouring out of the rear of the block when the engine warmed up. There is no way that it is oil smoke, and I don't think that it was steam. Admittedly a bit of anti-freeze spilled when I disconnected the TB, but the engine smoked for a good 6 minutes after I stopped the engine.
The smoke had little odor, but was unnervingly thick. Really seamed like it was coming from the crankcase vent, but the hose was in and the seal seemed good. Lots of smoke, like I thought a paper towel had gotten back there and was smoldering or something. I'm going to go check all the wires and make sure nothing was resting on the block, but in the meantime does anyone have any ideas? I can't imagine that I got anything wrong on the reassembly, but if these symptoms are indicative of anything please let me know. Thanks for your thoughts.
 
with the idle air control valve plugged in I can keep it alive with the throttle, but there is a popping coming from the engine room. Otherwise with the IAC plugged in she just fires up like a champ and dies immediately like the ignition is off.