non-db selections in mysql, php

Greetings. I understand how to use PHP/MySQL to query the database and return the record I want.... but i need to use MySQL's date and time functions apart from a record selection, and I can't figure out which of PHP's mysql functions to use ... e.g. the mysql statement "select weekday(20000704010101) is a valid query in MySQL... but how did I read this statement in conjunction with PHP to read the result? Thanks in advance, Kenn \