So, I popped open up Flash CS5 just now, and I couldn't find my projects panel. I was working on a dual screen set up previously, so my windows were everywhere anyways (sans external).
I switched over to a smaller screen workspace, and popped opened the projects panel. Oddly enough, the code snippets panel came up instead.
So, I switched off the code snippets, and tried again.
I've been trying different ways of opening this panel for about 15 minutes, and I'm totally stumped. Some thorough googling didn't present any relevant results, so, StackOverflow, I turn to you. Is this a known issue? is there a secret backdoor way to open this panel? Am I totally missing something?
So, just in case someone runs into this, and mostly because this is ruining my accept rate, I never figured out what the issue was that was causing this. I believe that opening a new flash file will revive the project panel, but as it currently shows up without a flash file open, the problem is resolved, but I don't have an answer to anyone with the same question. As Allan suggested, windows/workspace/reset didn't do the trick, but who knows, maybe it'll work for someone else?