For a while I had some trouble getting the register_activation_hook() hook to work for a plugin. After some debugging and comparing with a plugin I had made in the past I realized that the hook for this plugin was not in the same file as that of the plugin description.
/* Plugin Name: The best plugin ever Description: This plugin is going to do awesome things Author: Levi Jackson Version: 0.1 Author URI: http://www.levijackson.net */
After I moved the register_activation_hook() call to the file I had placed that description in, everything worked as I expected it to.