Why do dryers Vent outside?

As winter has now well and truly set in down here in Melbourne I've been having more trouble getting clothes dried at home. The days are too short and my backyard too shaded for clothes to dry in a day on the clothes line and leaving them for multiple days doesn't work much better either. The current cobbled together solution is to hang the clothes on a drying rack and have it sitting in the house for a few days. But, the only way that the clothes actually dry in less than a week is if that rack is in front of the living room heater.

And so it would seem that they experiment to save a bit of cash by not going out and buying a clothes dryer (and getting it mounted etc) may be coming to an end. But it occurs to me that there is one rather silly point about how our house (and pretty much everyone I've seen) is designed. There is an exhaust fan in our laundry and the only reason it is there is to vent to dryer exhaust out of the laundry and out of the house. If the laundry was on an external wall of the house there could even be a direct vent to the outside to get the hot air from the dryer to freedom.

The thing is though, that in summer we don't need a dryer. Even on rainy days using the clothes horse inside the house gets stuff dry pretty quick. So really the only time that we really need a dryer is in the middle of winter, which also happens to be the only time that we need heating in the house.

So why would we pump the heat from the dryer outside and then turn the heater on at home?

What we really need is a good way to divert the excess heat from the dryer into the house.

Of course there is one big issue with this Humidity! You might have to dehumidify the air a bit before pumping it into the house to prevent condensation and the like. But in general a little bit more humidity in the air could be a good thing because of the drying effects of winter.

I hate to see so much energy being wasted and think that we can save a hell of a lot by combining lots of simple ideas into our everyday lives, a little bit here and there adds up to a lot.

I've hit the Winter Wall

And it sucks!

Call it whatever you want but the Winter Wall to me is my complete lack of motivation that tends to arrive around this time every year. It happens in a similar way every year. I am going to rugby training, going to the gym (and this year riding to work) on a dailyish basis.
Then I run smack on into the winter wall.
This usually occurs, with either a cold, or an injury (this year I rolled an ankle), prior to this catalyst I can happily push through the crappy weather etc to keep the training going. However once the winter wall is hit motivation is right down, without the "forced" rigours of Rugby training and games I could easily see myself doing very, very little.
Undoubtedly a large part of the difficulty arises from the temperature and the lack of light, I can't force myself to do the usual things that help get me back into the zone. Even things that I would do in the warmer, longer dayed months no longer occur, for instance, I'm much more likely to drive to the shops after work in the dark than I am to walk or jump on my bike.
Each year I tell myself that this year will be different, but that reality is I am probably kidding myself when I say that anyway. To be honest I am fairly sure that I suffer from a particular form of SAD (or Seasonal affective disorder) and I'd say considering that I know a lot of other people that suffer from a mid-year, winter induced hiatus from exercise, or at least a large reduction in the amount of exercise performed, that it is a rather common affliction.
I can not think of a cure, I am tempted to see if I can try some sort of light therapy and I think I'll investigate it. In the meantime however it looks like I'll have to wait a few weeks and see if transporting myself into the depths of a North American summer has enough impact on the Winter Wall for me to smash a few holes in it and break on through to the other side.