I'm totally not an expert with this, but I think you can do the /users/friends/jesse style routes. There's functionality for nesting resources which will do that. There's also a prefix option I believe. As for the id, one way is to override to_param in your model, as such:
def to_param "#{id}-#{name[0,40].gsub(/[^a-z1-9]+/i, '-')}" end
I didn't write that, and I forget who did, but basically that will give you id's that are id#-the-name-of-the-record. Replace "name" with whichever attribute you want to use as the "name."
Having said all of that, I kind of agree that the new stuff seems a bit too strict and only works well when you commit to it completely. I've being doing a mix and match in my new app and on some days I think Simple RESTful is the greatest thing ever, and on other days I'm pulling my hair out. I'd say there's more to love than not though.
Cheers, John