I understand "cloying" to mean something good that becomes distasteful in excess.

Here is a sentence I read today from [this article][1]:

> But the aerial assault on the stubborn blaze, which blanketed much of
> the New Orleans area with cloying smoke for a third straight day, is
> unlikely to extinguish the fire or end the smoke quickly, Landrieu
> said.

So when I read "cloying smoke" I assume the author intends to portray smoke as pleasurable in limited quantities?  Is this just an idiom?  Help me make sense of it.  From a google search it appears the phrase is not uncommon.


  [1]: http://www.nola.com/environment/index.ssf/2011/08/helicopters_douse_marsh_fire_t.html