A Declaration and a Plea (Animation)

I've got a weekend to myself coming up, and I have decided that I'm finally going to make an animation that I've been sitting on for years. As such, I officially declare that by Sunday night, I will have FINISHED and PUBLISHED said video.

In addition, I have no fucking clue what I'm doing. I don't know what software to start with or how it works.

The entire world seems to animate with Flash. Is it free? Is it intuitive? Am I gonna succeed?

Advice from any animators out there?

I'm looking at Ajax, Stickman, Pivot, or Synfig. Anyone have any experience with these? Reviews seem to be a bit thin on the ground.
 

I detest flash, but I've not used the alternatives...

Wow, I hadn't really thought about that.

Unsurprisingly, this project got an LOL, no when the weekend actually arrived.

Oh, well. Someday.