Hey man,
Welcome to the wonderful world of Hondas...
It's nice to see that although u enjoy domestic cars, u realize that Honda's are incredibly reliable and can be made quick pretty easily.
First off, you're comment "it can't be cammed, it idles too smoothly" is remarkable, considering what VTEC is, because that is exactly what it was designed to do...
In your buddies DOHC VTEC motor, he has two-seperate cam lobes, which turn on for the different engine load conditions.
DOHC VTEC, is like having 2 different cams in your car at the same time, because one is optimized for low-rpm and the other is optimized for high-rpm.
the high-rpm cam, if it was to stay "on" at idle, would indeed have a "lumpy" idle, because it is exactly the same as having a high-rpm cam in a V8 domestic...
Most people (domestic guys) don't really understand the operation of it, they just HATE on it, cause it really does work, and it makes them when they lose to a 4 cylinder...
It's called technology, something that, unfortunately, domestic car makers have turned away from, instead choosing to build out-dated designs, such as pushrod engines.
I'll update some more when I get a chance,
Later