Tales from the workplace

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I am going to start posting stories from my job, because I think they're funny.  I've done my best to disguise my company name, even the industry, and to keep the people I write about and even some details of the situation anonymous.  If you know me, and know where I work, please don't include details in your comments.  I'll have to delete your comment and reconsider posting these stories.
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Guy comes into the office, asks if we're hiring (yes, that's apparently how it's done in this industry, or at least in this office).  I say not currently, but if he'd like to fill out an application, we'll keep it on file (and we truly do look at them when we actually are hiring).  He said he has worked here in the past, and implied he was hoping we'd just hire him on the spot.  The owner (and hire-er) wasn't in, so I told him so, took his information, and told him I'd let the owner know he was interested.

In the meantime, I looked up his employment history in our oh-so-sophisticated system.

Hire date 3/1/14 [this is made up, but whatever]
Termination date 3/2/14 [also made up, but you get the idea]

I looked up his pay stub history--he worked a grand total of seven hours for us.  One day.  The notes say he quit because he had another job.

So.  This guy applied for a job with us, took it, came in, filled out new hire paperwork, got some training, and spent a couple hours being minimally productive on his first day, and then at the end of the day, or by phone the next morning, quit because he had another job after all.  Seriously?

So of course when the owner recalled that history out of his own memory supplemented by our sophisticated system, he, of course, said that no, he'd rather not rehire this person.

The guy came back to the office again today.  The owner was busy talking to someone else, so I told him that I had mentioned him to the owner, but because he'd left the job after only one day and without notice, that made him ineligible for rehire.  He just stared at me blankly.  (There is a bit of a language barrier, but still.)

I repeated myself, and he said, "But I told them I was quitting.  I had another job."

"Yes, but you didn't give notice, so you're not eligible for rehire."

"But I had another job."

By this point, the owner was done with his other conversation and repeated what I'd just been repeating.

The guy kept explaining that he quit because he had another job.  As if that was such a virtuous reason that no further explanation was needed.  I realized that between the language barrier and potential cultural barrier, he probably truly thought that explaining WHY he was leaving was "giving notice," so I said that since he hadn't announced he would be leaving in two weeks, then WORKED those two weeks," he hadn't given us notice, but rather left suddenly.  He seemed to get it then, and left.

I feel bad for turning down someone who apparently does (now!) need a job, but seriously...who leaves a job after one day, without prior notice, and expects to get that same job back on the spot some number of months/years later?