Seriously? What kind of “bacon” are you buying?
“It’s been years” since you cooked bacon. There’s your first tip off that you aren’t a fan of bacon.
You bought your bacon at the convenience store. Probably OK but not great.
You overcooked the bacon until the fat burned. Not the fault of the yummy bacon. If it’s smoking near the end, you overcooked it.
So I’m trying to figure out what’s going on with the OP. There’ve been times when I’ve cooked bacon that was a little past its best-by date, and it’s had a weird sour smell, and I’ve thrown it out. Is it possible that this bacon was slightly spoiled?
In reading about making modern bacon (in McGee’s On Food and Cooking), it looks like most modern bacon is only “cured” for a few hours, mostly just injected wtih a brine of 15% salt and 10% sugar. This watery brine is cooked off.
So, there’s a mist in the air of sugar, salt, and animal proteins. I guess I could see how that might evoke urine in some people’s minds.
Bacon is one of the foods we aren’t allowed to microwave in the break room kitchen at work. The Smell lingers and gets around the entire building.
I microwave it at home and don’t notice the smell after 15 or 20 mins. I haven’t cooked bacon in a skillet in at least 10 years. Microwave is so much easier.
Almost exactly what I was going to say. Though it depends on just what you’re using it for: Eating it straight, crispy is ideal, but a little bit chewy is OK. For a BLT, the crisp is essential. And as a first step in cooking something else, like chili or baked beans, it should be a bit short of crisp.
Crispy to burny … skating a razor’s edge of deliciousness.
Anybody remember the contest for the Bacon Alarm Clock app, complete with scent emitter. I entered but didn’t win. 
Well there’s your problem. Don’t buy bacon made from a pig’s taint.
Yup. My main bacon consumption is in sandwiches (cold cuts, bacon, lettuce, pickled onions, avocado, tomato, sriracha, mayo, pepper, salt on toast–goddamn I’m hungry), and the crispness is necessary there as well. If the bacon is eaten straight, I’m okay with anything more done than rubber and less done than charcoal.
I gave up eating breakfast sausage years ago after catching a whiff of the pan used to cook some maple sausage. XP
How do you feel about chitlins?
Cooking bacon should never smoke; you have the heat too high. You can make perfectly crispy brown bacon at a lower temperature that does not smoke.