How do I get my description in the Google SERPs looking pretty? That is the topic of discussion at one thread named Google Descriptions Revisited over at HighRankings forum.
Google will most likely not use your META description within its SERPs. For example, lets take my corporate site, http://www.rustybrick.com/. Conducting a search on rustybrick, brings back the description "Web design, web development, web programming, e-commerce, .Net technologies and more Web technologies in New York (NY) by RustyBrick." View the source of the rustybrick homepage and you will see the description is being pulled from the content within the <noscript> tag.
Next example is when I conducted a search on rustybrick web design, trying to trigger a new description. What I received back was "RustyBrick Quick Service Overview: Web services; web design, web development, web programming, e-commerce, search engine optimization, .NET technologies web." That content is being pulled from the bottom of the rustybrick homepage.
So the META description is not often used by Google in the SERPs.