Creating Pop-up menus in Rails

Hi

Apologies if this is a basic question.I am a ruby beginner

What is the best way (or any way) to create a pop-up menu navigation.
I have a set of menu items and for each there will be a set of sub-menu items depending various conditions.
I tried it using remote_function on mouse in and out however though it sort of works works, the sub-menu tend to flicker

I am using the following code:
layouts/_side.rhtml
========================================================================================
  <table>
  <% @top_actions.each do  |toptitle,topcontroller,topaction|%>
    <tr onmouseover="<%= remote_function(:url => {:controller => topcontroller,:action =>topaction,:clink => topcontroller})%>"
        onmouseout="<%= remote_function(:url => {:controller => topcontroller,:action =>topaction,:clink => 'fade'})%>">
    <td align='left' width='99%'><%=  toptitle %></td>
     <% if topcontroller == params["clink"] %>
            <td align="right" width="1%"><%=  image_tag "largearrowright.gif" %></td><td align="left" valign="top">
            <div id="side_acts"><%= render :partial => "/layouts/side_acts", :object => @side_acts %></div></td>
        <%else%>
           <td align="right" width="1%">&nbsp;</td>
        <% end %>

   </tr>
  <% end %>
  </table>
==========================================================================
layouts/_side_acts.rhtml
==========================================================================
<div id="action2" class="action2">
  <% if params["clink"] %>
    <% if @side_acts %>
    <table width="100%">
        <tr valign="top"><td width="100%">
        <% @side_acts.each do |title,controller,action,param|%>
            <li><%= link_to title  , :controller => controller, :action => action, :id => param %></li>
        <% end %>
        </td></tr>
    </table>
    <% end %>
  <% end %>
</div>
==============================================================================

and the remote_function will always be side_acts which I put in application_controller
==========
def side_acts

    if params["clink"]
      clink = params["clink"]
    end

    if clink == 'fade'
      @side_acts = nil
      render :update do |page|
        page.replace_html 'side_acts', :partial => '/layouts/side_acts' , :object => @side_acts
        page.visual_effect(:fade,'side_acts',:duration => 1)
      end
      return
    end

    if clink == "login"
      @side_acts = [
              ["sub-menu title x","controller_name","action"],
              ["sub-menu title x2","controller_name","action2"],
               etc ..
            ]
    elsif clink == "something else"
       @side_acts = [
             ["sub-menu title y","temperatures","new","HEX"],
             ["SBV","temperatures","new","SBV"]
       ]

    elsif clink == "admin"
       @side_acts = [
             ["sub-menu title y","controller_name","action"],
             ["sub-menu title y2","controller_name","action2"],
               etc ..
       ]

       etc etc

    if params["clink"]
     render :update do |page|
       page.replace_html 'side2', :partial => '/layouts/side' , :object => params["clink"]
       page.replace_html 'side_acts', :partial => '/layouts/side_acts' , :object => @side_acts
     end
    end
  end

================================================================================

As I mentioned earlier the above works but not well at all , I get flickers when the mouse is on the sub-menu

Any help will be appreciated