Comment by damncabbage

you list, move, rename and delete branches with branch, but create branches using checkout? Seriously???

  git checkout -b new-branch

... is a shortcut for:

  git branch new-branch
  git checkout new-branch

You can create the branch or otherwise manipulate it without actually checking it out, so it's useful to have it separate and have a shortcut.

(I agree that git's interface is terrible, but I disagree that this is one of those cases. :) )