Google + and rankings

Hi guys I created a Google plus account for things related to online writing and other online money making ventures but i have yet to add a picture. Do you think now having a picture on my Google plus account will decrease any actual benefit that the rel="author" tag would actually have on my articles? Any experiences?

Question: When the author thing is added, do we see our own image in searches as well? Because, it's been more than a month and my profile doesn't appear near the related searches. 

Yes, you should see your picture as well. Have you trialled in the rich snippets tool?

It took mine a few weeks to start filtering into the SERPS, and even now not all of them have my pic.

Yup, I've done it right, that's for sure :) But, it's still not appearing on any

I can't tell you why Google show some author pictures and not others. I've had my own image appear and disappear at times. It may still be an experimental feature for all we know.

As others have suggested, look up any of your articles with the "Structured Data Testing Tool" here:

http://www.google.com/webmasters/tools/richsnippets

As you can see, everything is set up properly from our end. Google recognizes you as the author and even shows your image.

screenshot

But, as they say: "Google doesn't guarantee to show author information in Google Web Search or Google News results."