The Short List, The Long List. How do you do it?

It seems like every perfumista has a few lists. The list for perfumes they don't like, the ones they like, the ones that they love. There could be a list for notes, perfume houses and such but that isn't what I'm so interested in. It's the list of the to buy. I wonder how others do this. Is there a short list, a long list or something totally different?

Usually when I initially fall in love with something, I will order another decant but a little larger decant. If I drain that larger decant, I take a look at my full bottle collection and see how much I love it and if I already have something similar in my collection. If I don't, I take a look at the two lists that I have going. One list is what I call my "short list". The short list is the ones that are the ones that I want the most. The "long list" is the one for the ones that I can wait for a while before buying. What can be great about the long list is that I often do retest later on (sometimes I have a squirt or two left of a larger decant) to see if I still do want a full bottle and most of the time, I don't. I usually find it larger decant worthy and not a full bottle.

The short list perfumes are funny things. I love them and want a bottle but there are things that make me stop short on getting a full bottle. Most of the time it is price that stops me and I figure out how long it would take me to save up for a bottle. And sometimes it's how big the bottle is (I'm looking at Liu and L'Heure de Nuit). I can justify the cost of Guerlain's Liu due to the fact that for a shade over 4 ounces, yes, it can cost a shade over maybe $200 but I'm not sure yet if I want to spend almost $280. There are a few others on my short list that I would like but perfume prices are starting to kill me along with smaller bottle sizes because I am like a few other people, I want the most bang I can get for my buck.