When he wasn't cutting deals with terrorists, torturing dissidents, or adding to his vast collection of tents and military uniforms, Muammar Gaddafi liked nothing more than to bash out rambling letters to his American pen pal.
So says Louis Schlamowitz, an 81-year-old Jewish florist from Brooklyn, who spent several years of his adult life exchanging notes, signed photographs and Christmas cards with the late Libyan dictator.
Like any loyal friend, he was surprised and upset at the violent manner in which Gaddafi was removed from office.
"I felt bad about the way he was killed," the elderly New Yorker said, showing off a scrapbook of their correspondence. "He should have stepped down like the President of Egypt ... It's about power and money, and when they lose it, they go down and the people who are their advisers go down with them."
Schlamowitz began sending unsolicited letters to Gaddafi in the late 1960s, shortly after he had seized power, congratulating him on his elevation to high office. To his surprise, the Libyan leader swiftly wrote back. "He was a good pen pal," he said. "I felt it was very nice of him to take the time to write back to me, because I'm nobody special."