The rule, "the smaller part of a conditional should go first" conflicts with the rule, "the expected path should go first". The justification for the second rule is that it makes the code more natural to skim. That is, of course, secondary to wanting to make it clear what is part of the conditional. But it is not totally irrelevant.
I usually put the expected result first, and avoid the size issue by moving the body of long blocks into functions. That probably works 95% of the time. The exceptions are mainly cases where I have nested control logic that I want to keep in one place, or situations where I need to inline a long piece of text (eg an SQL statement). Then I will move the shortest block first for the reason that you give.
So my rules in order of precedence are to make it obvious what belongs to the conditional, and then to make the most common flow of the program match the natural flow of skimming. But the more important can usually be satisfied without harming the second, and I do.
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