Hi, I have a lot of 'pull out' menus for sub categories in my store (http://www.kitchenwaresetc.com) and I have been getting a mixed feedback on how they are treated by the search engines. Other then the fact (or at least I know this with some amount of certanty) that search enginess can not read the text in these menus it appears that the search enginess also treat these as outgoing links. In addition some other pages appears to be treated as outgoing links (like shop by brand - I guess another form of the 'pull out' menu). Does anyone know for sure if the pull out menues are treated as outgoing links, and how 'bad' does it impacts my ranking etc..., considering that the more outgoing links I have the worst my ranking is?

Thanks.