This seems like a good opportunity to plug two aliases I wrote about a year ago that have been very helpful for cleaning up all the extraneous branches that would show up when I ran `git branch`.

I run `git listdead` after I merge and delete a branch and do the next fetch (`git pull --rebase`). That lists the branches that can now be deleted.

Then I run `git prunedead` and it actually removes them.

Previously if I ran `git branch` it would list every development branch I had ever created in nearly a decade of work. Now it lists maybe ten branches.

   listdead = "!sh -c \"git branch -vv | grep ': gone]' | awk '{print \\$1}'\""

   prunedead = "!sh -c \"git branch -vv | grep ': gone]' | awk '{print \\$1}' | xargs git branch -D\""