formatting

I'm writing a document that has a large number of lists containing short enumeration items, and I'd like to be able to [manually] put multiple items on one line. Thus, for example, I'd like to say

I'm quite happy with making the one line/two lines decision myself (in fact, I'd prefer it), so all I'm looking for is a macro that will determine the current enum counter, do the right thing regarding horizontal spacing, and print the item. It would be nice if this would work with enumerate, description, and itemize lists (or with general lists). (For a description list, I guess something like \samelineitem[newlabel] Text of item).

Is there a package with such a capability, or would anyone out there like to tell me how to do it? Thanks.