Jerry, hopefully the idea of paying out
rode slowly and drifting down on your
anchor to proper
scope in normal conditions makes sense. Try to visualize the
anchor going straight down and keep the
rode just taught enough to keep from fouling the anchor, until 5x or so is paid out and snug it up. Pretty straightforward.
What can confound you is when
wind is against
current, if your
boat has a substantial underbody. Sometimes the
boat will turn and lie to the rode backwards, cleated at the bow. Maybe even get fouled on your
keel.
Most of the time you will do the
classic drop and drift, but be aware that sometimes it is not so simple. In these situations you do not have the ideal anchor IMHO. On a smaller boat, a hunk of plow w some chain will at least give you some more deadweight to drift around if you botch it, then likely set once conditions apply sufficient force in one direction.
There are some anchor
alarm apps for smart phones and some
GPS units have them as well.
If you find yourself
anchoring out more, consider one of the various flavors of plow type anchors, as others have suggested, with maybe 25' of chain, and keep the
fortress as a second.
Happy anchoring-