Inflammation or swelling of one or more lymph nodes. It may be an acute response or chronic, but signals the drainage into those nodes of microbes, their waste products, or the immuno-complexes produced upstream, whether from infection or allergy. A few infections can target or inhabit lymph nodes such as typhoid and EBV. Some people, with a past history of infection in a specific tissue (such as chronic sore throat as a kid) will have developed a LARGER sized node, hard and permanently palpable. These are hypertrophic or "shotty" nodes, and of no more importance than pumped-up muscles or old scar tissue.