chef-client cookbook can't find gem to extract files on ubuntu under omnibus

ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:02 +0000] INFO: *** Chef 0.10.8 ***
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:08 +0000] INFO: Run List is [role[base]]
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:08 +0000] INFO: Run List expands to [chef-client]
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:08 +0000] INFO: Starting Chef Run for i-d4e1bab0
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:08 +0000] INFO: Running start handlers
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:08 +0000] INFO: Start handlers complete.
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:08 +0000] INFO: Loading cookbooks [chef-client]
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:08 +0000] INFO: Storing updated cookbooks/chef-client/recipes/delete_validation.rb in the cache.
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:08 +0000] INFO: Storing updated cookbooks/chef-client/recipes/default.rb in the cache.
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:09 +0000] INFO: Storing updated cookbooks/chef-client/recipes/service.rb in the cache.
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:09 +0000] INFO: Storing updated cookbooks/chef-client/recipes/config.rb in the cache.
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:09 +0000] INFO: Storing updated cookbooks/chef-client/attributes/default.rb in the cache.
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:09 +0000] INFO: Storing updated cookbooks/chef-client/README.md in the cache.
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:09 +0000] INFO: Storing updated cookbooks/chef-client/metadata.rb in the cache.
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:09 +0000] INFO: Storing updated cookbooks/chef-client/metadata.json in the cache.
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:09 +0000] ERROR: Running exception handlers
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:09 +0000] FATAL: Saving node information to /var/chef/cache/failed-run-data.json
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:09 +0000] ERROR: Exception handlers complete
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:09 +0000] FATAL: Stacktrace dumped to /var/chef/cache/chef-stacktrace.out
ec2-23-20-246-146.compute-1.amazonaws.com [Fri, 23 Mar 2012 20:19:09 +0000] FATAL: Errno::ENOENT: No such file or directory - /gems/chef-0.10.8/distro/debian/etc/default/chef-client