Timestamp and MySQL

Hi everyone, I have discovered an annoying thing with MySQL and PHP. When I create a table in MySQL with a column using TIMESTAMP, it stores a timestamp in the format of yyyymmddhhmmss, rather than the standard unix timestamp. This means that I then cannot use the time functions in PHP to work with it. Is the a function in PHP, or MySQL to persuade them to both understand the same format? If not, I can manage by just writing the date into MySQL manually, but it's messy. Thanks Glen Ogilvie New Zealand