If you want to read my theme posts about the Google+ theme and limitations, you can see me on g+ [link] and here is the specific post [link]
Basically, I've had to make a few design compromises with the theme in the chat and notification area because they're the same thing. Making themes like this has it's limitations because upstream design the code to fit the default theme, which limits us third party theme designers. Notification-body is a prime example, you do a nice border and background for the chat and then it shows that in the notification background, effectively breaking the design.
I hope you understand that sometimes I design things the way they are to get around such limitations, and it can be a little frustrating.







