title: git checkout of a branch is giving "Your branch and 'origin/prod-env' have diverged"
body: <p>we have a dev branch (main), and a production branch (prod-env).
  I have main checked out, up to date, and no changes (clean).
  I want to see what is on prod, so tried to checkout the prod branch using:</p>
  <p>$ git checkout main</p>
  <p>$ git pull</p>
  <p>$ git status</p>
  <p>On branch main
  Your branch is up to date with 'origin/main'.</p>
  <p>$ git checkout prod-env.</p>
  <p>This gives:</p>
  <pre><code>Your branch and 'origin/prod-env' have diverged,  and have 26 and 333 different commits each, respectively.
  (use &quot;git pull&quot; to merge the remote branch into yours)
  </code></pre>
  <p>This odd as i have never checkedout out prod-env, and I have no changes. I have never used rebase or force due to danger.</p>
  <p>How do I</p>
  <ol>
  <li><p>backout of where I am now, and</p>
  </li>
  <li><p>checkout the prod-env branch without getting these (apparently) non-existent errors?</p>
  </li>
  </ol>
  <p>Im guessing another solution might be to clone the repo in a different location, and only checkout prod-env (never checkout main).  Will that avoid this problem?</p>
  <p>I certainly don't want to merge anything with prod-env, as that wont tell me whats on prod-env.</p>