[Puppet Users] cert issues, puppet agent applying configs, problems oh my!

So I'm new to puppet and I'm having a bear of a time just getting a test
server going.
I installed puppet and the puppet client via yum on CentOS on AWS, so that
saved me some time.
I followed a few various blog posts about getting everything set up and
applying a file, etc.

Now I am trying to install a module (puppetlabs/apache) and it's failing
miserably for me.
I installed the module on the puppetmaster, and then tried running a test
command to pull down the configs:

# puppet agent --verbose --test
dnsdomainname: Unknown host
dnsdomainname: Unknown host
notice: Ignoring --listen on onetime run
dnsdomainname: Unknown host
dnsdomainname: Unknown host
info: Caching catalog for ip-10*
info: Applying configuration version '1342645763'
info: FileBucket adding {md5}e92bea7e9d70a9ecdc61edd7c0a2f59a
info: /File[/etc/httpd/conf.d/README]: Filebucketed
/etc/httpd/conf.d/README to puppet with sum e92bea7e9d70a9ecdc61edd7c0a2f59a
notice: /File[/etc/httpd/conf.d/README]/ensure: removed
info: /File[httpd_vdir]: Scheduling refresh of Service[httpd]
info: FileBucket adding {md5}2674ddafcede67ed823db6e09c8c8985
info: /File[/etc/httpd/conf.d/authz_ldap.conf]: Filebucketed
/etc/httpd/conf.d/authz_ldap.conf to puppet with sum
2674ddafcede67ed823db6e09c8c8985
notice: /File[/etc/httpd/conf.d/authz_ldap.conf]/ensure: removed
info: /File[httpd_vdir]: Scheduling refresh of Service[httpd]
info: FileBucket adding {md5}98bb7dc6a56eba83a0f9713eec2d85ba
info: /File[/etc/httpd/conf.d/perl.conf]: Filebucketed
/etc/httpd/conf.d/perl.conf to puppet with sum
98bb7dc6a56eba83a0f9713eec2d85ba
notice: /File[/etc/httpd/conf.d/perl.conf]/ensure: removed
info: /File[httpd_vdir]: Scheduling refresh of Service[httpd]
info: FileBucket adding {md5}8b0da169a5f7963b6bf28f9d8de7785f
info: /File[/etc/httpd/conf.d/proxy_ajp.conf]: Filebucketed
/etc/httpd/conf.d/proxy_ajp.conf to puppet with sum
8b0da169a5f7963b6bf28f9d8de7785f
notice: /File[/etc/httpd/conf.d/proxy_ajp.conf]/ensure: removed
info: /File[httpd_vdir]: Scheduling refresh of Service[httpd]
info: FileBucket adding {md5}547f3a175849ad68a7a1a6d65df1afd5
info: /File[/etc/httpd/conf.d/python.conf]: Filebucketed
/etc/httpd/conf.d/python.conf to puppet with sum
547f3a175849ad68a7a1a6d65df1afd5
notice: /File[/etc/httpd/conf.d/python.conf]/ensure: removed
info: /File[httpd_vdir]: Scheduling refresh of Service[httpd]
info: FileBucket adding {md5}17c85a1796be14bdac36d34f25b955b0
info: /File[/etc/httpd/conf.d/ssl.conf]: Filebucketed
/etc/httpd/conf.d/ssl.conf to puppet with sum
17c85a1796be14bdac36d34f25b955b0
notice: /File[/etc/httpd/conf.d/ssl.conf]/ensure: removed
info: /File[httpd_vdir]: Scheduling refresh of Service[httpd]
info: FileBucket adding {md5}d1e9d20dbcec6fe4237204f214284e95
info: /File[/etc/httpd/conf.d/webalizer.conf]: Filebucketed
/etc/httpd/conf.d/webalizer.conf to puppet with sum
d1e9d20dbcec6fe4237204f214284e95
notice: /File[/etc/httpd/conf.d/webalizer.conf]/ensure: removed
info: /File[httpd_vdir]: Scheduling refresh of Service[httpd]
info: FileBucket adding {md5}98540d3009ecc6435d8770c24a71258a
info: /File[/etc/httpd/conf.d/welcome.conf]: Filebucketed
/etc/httpd/conf.d/welcome.conf to puppet with sum
98540d3009ecc6435d8770c24a71258a
notice: /File[/etc/httpd/conf.d/welcome.conf]/ensure: removed
info: /File[httpd_vdir]: Scheduling refresh of Service[httpd]
notice: /Stage[main]/Apache/Service[httpd]/enable: enable changed 'false'
to 'true'
notice: /Stage[main]/Apache/Service[httpd]: Triggered 'refresh' from 8
events
notice: Finished catalog run in 2.06 seconds



Looks good right? Until I try to run it for real:

[root@ip-10-*~]# puppet agent --verbose
dnsdomainname: Unknown host
dnsdomainname: Unknown host
Could not prepare for execution: Could not create PID file:
/var/run/puppet/agent.pid

I also tried forcing it down from the master to no avail:
# puppetrun --host pclient
Triggering pclient
Host pclient failed: hostname was not match with the server certificate
pclient finished with exit code 2
Failed: pclient


Then I tried:
# puppetd --verbose --no-daemonize --onetime
dnsdomainname: Unknown host
dnsdomainname: Unknown host
notice: Ignoring --listen on onetime run
dnsdomainname: Unknown host
dnsdomainname: Unknown host
info: Caching catalog for ip-*
info: Applying configuration version '1342645763'
notice: Finished catalog run in 0.40 seconds


Looks good no? Nope. Nothing happened and the files weren't pushed down.

I have both the master and client named in hosts files. I understand puppet
depends a lot on DNS and doesn't work that great with hosts files.
Is this a certificate issue?

Any explanation of why this is happening and how to resolve it would be
appreciated.