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When we get a respiratory virus infection, the misery of increased mucus flow, sneezing, coughing and general malaise is often made worse by the pain associated with the swelling of ‘glands’ in our neck. A boil on the forearm, or bacterial infection in the hand, will likely cause us to have the same experience in our armpit. The ‘glands’ we’re talking about here are the lymph nodes (#39) where primary immune responses kick off. The pain is caused by the fact that the outer connective tissue capsule of these (normally) small, cream-coloured, kidney shaped organs contains pain receptors that are triggered when the lymph node swells.