>>There may be a better and quicker way, but in a case like this I 
>> would do a clean checkout. It takes a few hours, but at least you 
>> can be sure everything is as it should be.
> 
> How do I do that?
> 
> My fear is as my local tree continually self-explodes, I am going 
> to end up cloninge the entire tree, which at 4 or 5 GBs will take 
> all damn day.

That's what I was suggesting :) Yes, it does take a hell of a lot of time :(


> There must be some kind of repair procedure?

I don't know either :( 


  Michele