please tell me "eat" is an irregular verb because I do not want to have to learn a conjugation that manages to incorporate both daósą́ and yishą́! (-- or maybe ą́ means "to eat"? :P)

To eat is one of very few verbs where the initial consonant of the stem merges in unexpected ways with the personal prefix.

A non-fusing verb would look like this (to cry) : - 1sg: yishcha
- 2sg: nicha
- 3: yicha
- 1du: yiicha (