$sql1 = "SELECT
    indexer,
    user_id,
    friends_id		AS from_id,			//Change result name to from_id
    'friend'			AS type,				//For each record found add a result called 'type' containing 'friend'
    todays_date
  FROM friends
  WHERE friends_id = $user_id";

Outputting Results As A Comma Separated List (Or any character separated)

	$QueryString = "SELECT CONCAT_WS(',',SomeColumnName0,SomeColumnName1,SomeColumnName2) 
									FROM MyTable WHERE SomeColumn = 12";
								//"CONCAT_WS(','," to cause results to be comma seperated for us
				
	$Query1 = @mysql_query($QueryString);
	$ResultsCount = mysql_num_rows($Query1);
	while ($result1 = @mysql_fetch_array($Query1))
		$ResultString .= $result1[0];