[chef] knife ec2 server create -> undefined method `merge'

[Eric Jain < >]

The following command used to work... not sure what changed:

$ knife ec2 server create -VV -I ami-b89842d1 -f m1.small -G zzz
--region us-east-1 -Z us-east-1c -x ubuntu -S chef

DEBUG: Using configuration from /home/ubuntu/.chef/knife.rb
Instance ID: i-xxxxxxxx
Flavor: m1.small
Image: ami-b89842d1
Region: us-east-1
Availability Zone: us-east-1c
Security Groups: zzz
Tags: Namei-xxxxxxxx
SSH Key: chef

Waiting for server.......................
Public DNS Name: ec2-xxx-xxx-xxx-xxx.compute-1.amazonaws.com
Public IP Address: xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx
Private DNS Name: xxx-xxx-xxx-xxx.ec2.internal
Private IP Address: xxx.xxx.xxx.xxx

Waiting for sshd......DEBUG: sshd accepting connections on
ec2-xxx-xxx-xxx-xxx.compute-1.amazonaws.com, banner is
SSH-2.0-OpenSSH_5.9p1 Debian-5ubuntu1

done
Bootstrapping Chef on ec2-xxx-xxx-xxx-xxx.compute-1.amazonaws.com
DEBUG: Looking for bootstrap template in
/var/lib/gems/1.8/gems/chef-0.10.10/lib/chef/knife/bootstrap
DEBUG: Found bootstrap template in
/var/lib/gems/1.8/gems/chef-0.10.10/lib/chef/knife/bootstrap
/var/lib/gems/1.8/gems/chef-0.10.10/lib/chef/knife/core/bootstrap_context.rb:99:in
`first_boot': undefined method `merge' for "{}":String (NoMethodError)
        from (erubis):54:in `evaluate'
        from /var/lib/gems/1.8/gems/erubis-2.7.0/lib/erubis/evaluator.rb:74:in
`instance_eval'
        from /var/lib/gems/1.8/gems/erubis-2.7.0/lib/erubis/evaluator.rb:74:in
`evaluate'
        from 
/var/lib/gems/1.8/gems/chef-0.10.10/lib/chef/knife/bootstrap.rb:152:in
`render_template'
        from 
/var/lib/gems/1.8/gems/chef-0.10.10/lib/chef/knife/bootstrap.rb:210:in
`ssh_command'
        from 
/var/lib/gems/1.8/gems/chef-0.10.10/lib/chef/knife/bootstrap.rb:190:in
`knife_ssh'
        from 
/var/lib/gems/1.8/gems/chef-0.10.10/lib/chef/knife/bootstrap.rb:167:in
`run'
        from 
/var/lib/gems/1.8/gems/knife-ec2-0.5.13/lib/chef/knife/ec2_server_create.rb:256:in
`run'
        from /var/lib/gems/1.8/gems/chef-0.10.10/lib/chef/knife.rb:402:in
`run_with_pretty_exceptions'
        from /var/lib/gems/1.8/gems/chef-0.10.10/lib/chef/knife.rb:168:in 
`run'
        from 
/var/lib/gems/1.8/gems/chef-0.10.10/lib/chef/application/knife.rb:123:in
`run'
        from /var/lib/gems/1.8/gems/chef-0.10.10/bin/knife:25
        from /usr/local/bin/knife:19:in `load'
        from /usr/local/bin/knife:19